Last Friday I had a chance to visit “Polyton”, a discussion club that regularly convenes in one of the flats in the center of Almaty. Their website in English, though not regularly updated and has occasional mistakes, gives you an idea of what issues are being discussed there. The last topics (dated January, though they do regularly meet) are “Russia in the new changing world”, “Mythologisation of Eurasian Nomads’ history”, “Presidential elections in Kazakhstan: a choice of the person or a new way of development”, and so on. Their meeting room is equipped with microphones, and is full of portraits, including ones of Sarsenbayev and Tuyakbai, among others. According to one of the attendees, if journalists come to Polyton, they are usually from the opposition.

I was told that the topic would be “Revising the History of Kazakhstan”, which I would be really interested in as I have just bought a new history book by Abdizhapar Abdakimov, former Secretary of the Temirtau Committee of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan, then deputy Akim of Temirtau and Karaganda, and who is now a director of the Karaganda Television and Radio Company. His book is one of those that try to revisit and re-write the history of Kazakhstan, as viewed by a former Communist. It gives a full analysis of 1986 protests, including Western approaches to it, studies the Kazakh diaspora and describes the Soviet regime as a tyrannical one.

The speakers at the meeting were Isabelle Ohayon, Junior Research Fellow at EHESS-CERCEC in Paris, doing research on the sedentarisation of Kazakhs and Soviet history of Central Asia and Julien Teres, a researcher in the geography of Kazakhstan (since I was late, I do not know which institution he is affiliate to). He discussed the future of Kazakhstan as a transit point (not much as the land transport is 30-40% more expensive than sea transport), and Kazakh railways, among other things.

Participants were very interested in discussing the future though, and some questions sounded like the headlines of Kazakh newspapers. For instance: what do you think is Kazakhstan’s future in light of its bid for OSCE chairmanship and joining 50 most competitive countries in the world? Or: politically, the Government promotes Kazakhstan as the center of Eurasia, but is it? Is it really a political center of - the world? It seems to me that the participant asking the questions was either being ironic or very naive. Clearly, French academics were confused and politely replied that they had just returned from the Congress of World Religions in Astana, and that yes, Kazakhstan has ambitions to become the center of Eurasia, but that there was no foreign media coverage of the Congress, really. In the end, an interesting debate on the history or future of Kazakhstan did not take place, but well, just having a place where people can freely discuss politics, economy and news beyond our “Matrix” of state-dominated media is undoubtedly a good thing.