NUR-SULTAN – The Kazakh government has been considering proposals for the demonopolization of some sectors of the economy, the Prime Minister’s Office reported on April 6.
Demonopolization is expected to take place in the construction, housing and communal services, transport, the functioning of roads and the manufacturing industry.
According to the Minister of Industry and Infrastructural Development Kairbek Uskenbayev, transparency in the process of obtaining technical specifications for connecting natural monopolies to the networks is one of the main areas of work. There is no reliable information on the location of engineering networks, connection points and free capacities. This creates conditions for illegally denied access to services or overstatements of budget requirements. It is proposed to oblige natural monopolies to digitize and regularly update information on networks, access points and free capacities for connecting consumers, and introduce registration of issued technical specifications on a single digital platform.
It is planned to exempt expert organizations from subscription fees for access to the information system of the provided data.
It is also planned to eliminate the monopoly of large internet communications providers while commissioning new houses. Several telecom operators will be made available for residents of new residential buildings.
Prime Minister Alikhan Smailov set forward the task to finalize other measures and submit updated proposals within a week.
The commission on demonopolization started its activities on March 24 at the behest of Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. The commission consists of the first heads of the anti-corruption, financial monitoring, competition protection and development agencies, members of the Prosecutor-General’s Office and the Samruk Kazyna National Welfare Fund. The commission will develop further proposals to demonopolize the economy.
