Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev Resigns Tuesday March 19,2019

 Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev  has abruptly announced his resignation 29 years after taking office. 

In a televised address on Tuesday March 19,2019, the 78-year-old said he has made the "difficult" decision to terminate his authority as president, but did not give a specific reason for the shocking decision.

"I have decided to end my duties as president," Nazarbayev said before signing a decree terminating his powers effective March 30. 

"This year I will have held the highest post for 30 years," he said. "As the founder of the independent Kazakh state, I see my task now in facilitating the rise of a new generation of leaders who will continue the reforms that are under way in the country."

Nazarbayev has led oil-rich Kazakhstan since 1989, when it was still part of the Soviet Union. He came to power as the country's Communist Party chief and was then elected president in 1991 weeks before the Soviet collapse.

Since then, he has extended his tenure by landslide victories in successive elections and plebiscites. In the 2015 election, he took nearly 98 percent of the vote.

Nazarbayev, who was elected for a fifth five-year term in 2015, said the speaker of the Central Asian country's legislative upper house, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, will serve as the interim head of state until a new election is held.
 

The announcement came less than a month after Nazarbayev fired his government, citing a lack of economic development despite the country's vast energy resources.

That decision stemmed from rising dissatisfaction in Kazakhstan where the commodity-dependent economy has struggled to recover from a 2014 plunge in Oil Prices and Western sanctions against Russia a key trading partner.

Nazarbayev subsequently named 53-year-old Askar Mamin as the new prime minister and announced a major spending plan on social programmes and state salaries.