Strongman Nazarbayev tipped for fresh term as Kazakhstan votes

Polls got underway on April 26 in energy-rich Kazakhstan for a ballot almost certain to re-elect 74-year-old strongman incumbent President Nursultan Nazarbayev.
 
Voting at over 9,000 polling stations across the country began at 0100 GMT and will continue until 1400 GMT, according to the Central Election Commission (CEC).
 
Few doubt the victory of autocrat Nazarbayev, who has ruled over the Central Asian country since before independence in 1991. If he wins the five-year term at stake, he will complete three decades as leader.
 
His marginalised opponents have not offered any candidates for the election but Nazarbayev will face two other rivals, both of whom are widely seen as pro-government figures.
 
Turgun Syzdykov, a 68-year-old former provincial official who has campaigned on an anti-globalisation platform, railing against Hollywood, hamburgers and computer games, will represent the Communist People's Party of Kazakhstan.
 
Abelgazy Kusainov, 63, who has held several important governmental positions and currently heads the national federation of trade unions, is standing as an independent after running a campaign touching on Kazakhstan's environmental problems.
 
Kusainov cast his vote minutes after polling stations opened in the capital Astana.
 
"This is not an election, it is a re-election," Dosym Saptaev, director of the Kazakhstan Risks Assessment Group, an think tank based in the largest city Almaty, told AFP.
 
"The significance of the event is no more than the fact that it may well be Nazarbayev's last."
 
An Ipsos MORI poll released April 21 showed 91 percent of Kazakhstanis are satisfied with the septuagenarian strongman's rule.
 
While the he has never...