Who needs Borat?

In this exclusive article, Nursultan Nazarbayev presents a different picture of his homeland to the caricature of Sasha Baron Cohen’s film. It is a thriving, optimistic nation. We like!

As the task of reconstructing Iraq has turned out to be more difficult and more bloody than Western governments anticipated, I believe that the recent history of Kazakhstan can provide an important lesson for would-be nation-builders. After all, both countries have emerged from a period of highly authoritarian rule, both possess substantial oil wealth and both have been subject to external pressures to introduce rapid political change.

Until 1992 when it became an independent state, Kazakhstan was desperately poor and desperately restricted. We possessed no knowledge or experience of self-government and very little understanding of how modern markets function. Independence had been thrust upon us by the turn of history and the break-up of the Soviet Union, and all we knew was that if we didn’t act quickly, instead of a new and independent Kazakh nation, we would have anarchy.