As reported by retired police lieutenant colonel Serzhan Arshabekov, the practice of covertly coercing civil servants into donating one day's salary to various charitable causes continues to exist in Kazakhstan.
"While I was working, this practice existed in the Ministry of Internal Affairs and not only there, but also in other state structures. From time to time, we would transfer money for veterans of the security forces or after an employee died in the line of duty. At first, it was all like that, but then fundraisers started for other reasons. For example, when there was the disaster in Arys or the explosion at the mine in Karaganda - it was unclear whose initiative it was, but orally, without orders or protocols, an 'initiative' to transfer one day's salary appeared. To be more precise - an order 'from above'. At that time, a large number of police officers wrote to me with complaints about the extortion", Serzhan Arshabekov told journalists at Ratel.kz.
According to him, such fundraisers are often conducted without official orders and written consent from employees.
"The mechanics are this - an employee of the HR department of a particular state body or police department announces at a general meeting that there is an initiative to collect funds to help with a particular situation. And, naturally, no one can refuse. At the same time, it is not specified who the author of the initiative is, and no written order is disclosed according to which employees must hand over their money. Then the accounting department simply takes and transfers one day's salary from the next pay without a written application from the employee. Moreover, the Tax Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan prohibits such deductions without the employee's permission", the former police officer said.
According to the former policeman's calculations, from employees of the internal affairs bodies of Kazakhstan alone, with a one-day salary of 5,000 tenge, around 685 million tenge can be collected in a single collection drive.
"And then there are civil servants. The worst part is that no one controls where this money goes, whether it reaches its intended purpose. The state here does not interfere in charity. In my opinion, it is difficult to even call this act charity, because an act of charity is a voluntary, not a forced, act of each individual person", stated Serzhan Arshabekov.
The former policeman has repeatedly contacted various state bodies to find out exactly where the collected money goes and who initiates the extortion. In response, the Ministry of Defence told him that damage in the event of an emergency is covered by the state.
"Deceased servicemen in the city of Arys received compensation payments for burial, a one-time compensation payment, a one-time housing payment for the purchase of housing, and injured servicemen received a one-time compensation payment. One-day salaries were not transferred to provide assistance to victims of the explosions in Arys, victims of the fire in the Abai region, and the accident at the mine in the Karaganda region", the ministry's response states.
It will be recalled that in November, it was reported that the AFM (Agency for Financial Monitoring) is conducting an investigation into activist and founder of the public charitable foundation 'BizBirgemiz Qazaqstan', Perizat Kairat. She is suspected of embezzling 1.7 billion tenge that was collected to help citizens affected by spring floods, as well as for humanitarian aid to residents of Palestine.
In mid-December, the court seized elite real estate, cars, electronics, clothing, footwear, jewellery, as well as bags from global brands belonging to the charity founder.