German Tabloid Reports Nazarbayev in Hospital
Eurasianet.org is reporting that President Nazarbayev is in the hospital in Hamburg, according to the German tabloid Bild. Nazarbayev is officially on vacation and the Kazakhstan Embassy in Germany says they have no idea if he is there or not.
It seems to me that there are a lot of unscary possibilities here:
1) Some famous Kazakh guy is in the hospital and German tabloid reporters are just assuming it’s the President.
2) Nazarbayev is getting a physical or some routine exam. Possibly he regularly goes to Germany for such things. The press rarely reports on his going to the doctor.
3) It’s a complete lie.
In any case, since a million Russian and English language papers are reporting on this, it’s no wonder he tried to keep it secret if indeed he is in the hospital. I think it’s a bit early to panic.
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the telegraph picked up the story and claims he is in the hamburg hospital for prostate surgery.
just the fact that you’re talking about when it is appropriate to panic speaks volumes about how serious an issue the lack of preparation for succession is.
Yeah the big story here, as the NYT picked up is that Kazakhstan has spent so much time promoting Nazarbayev as the only possible leader and keeping everyone else in check that people are afraid there is no one to replace him. And that power in Kazakhstan is linked very much to closeness to the President. I suspect, though I don’t know, that several people at the top of the heap right now might find their status significantly lowered once Nazarbayev is no longer there to help them.
This incident also shows that Kazakhstan would prefer the uninformed rumor mill to actually giving some news. Sort of a bizarre choice.
And of course, if it’s true that he was treated in Germany, how will the President ever say with a straight face that medicine in Kazakhstan is great?