The president said in a live broadcast Wednesday with a national TV station that the Kazakh economy is twice as efficient as those of Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Moldova and Georgia and has higher average wages.
The average Kazakh earns $300-plus salary, with the per capita GDP aggregating $3,300 in 2005. It is expected to rise to $4,200 in 2006 and to $5,800 between 2008 and 2010, reaching the same level of Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, Nazarbayev said.
Nazarbayev said he intends to keep his cabinet and noted the lack of constructive opposition in Kazakhstan.
"The normal opposition is still growing in the country, a mandatory attribute of a democratic state," Nazarbayev said.
He said an open society, currently rising in Kazakhstan, must encourage opposition, but should "work under the Constitution and Kazakh laws."
