Audit Finds Kazakhstan Used National Fund Money For Street Lighting And Village Clubs

Kazakhstan’s Supreme Audit Chamber has criticized the use of National Fund money for local-level projects,  Orda.kz reports.

The chamber found problems in the execution of the 2025 national budget. Its head, Alikhan Smailov, presented the findings at a Senate meeting.

According to Smailov, money from the National Fund, which is supposed to support strategic and large-scale projects, was in some cases used for local needs. These included street and park improvements, village clubs, and street lighting.

Instead of being used for strategic and national-scale projects, National Fund money was diverted to finance local projects — street and park improvements, construction of village clubs, and street lighting. A significant part of the projects was approved for financing without design and estimate documentation or prepared land plots,Smailov said.

Because of this, 132 projects worth more than 100 billion tenge had to be excluded or replaced during budget execution.

Smailov also pointed to problems with returning unused money to the National Fund. If money from the fund is not used on time, it must be returned. According to the chamber, this requirement is not always met.

About 83 billion tenge has not been returned,Smailov said.

The Supreme Audit Chamber also drew attention to delays in privatization. According to Smailov, utilities are mostly being transferred to the competitive sector, but in some cases this creates new problems for the regions.

Smailov said Kazakhstan still has problems with the quality and effectiveness of public spending.

Original author: Ilya Astakhov

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