Government Wants to Legalize Illegal Buildings in Water Protection Zone

The legalization will be done per the new version of the Water Code and to help low-income homeowners near water bodies.

However, this will allow the legalization of existing illegal buildings and those that will appear. Their owners will also be able to prove that they planned them before January 1, 2025. Press conference organizers in Almaty on November 14, 2024, reported this. An Orda correspondent attended the event.

The Majilis is considering a new version of the Water Code, prepared by specialists from the Ministry of Water Resources. It provides for several changes and amendments regarding managing water resources and facilities. 

Almaty's society was very concerned about the changes in Article 120, which prohibits the construction of capital facilities in water protection zones. It is currently 35 meters and will remain the same in the future.

This project proposes to legalize all facilities in water protection zones that have already been built or will be built. Their construction should have been planned before January 1, 2025, the date the latest Water Code enters force.  

According to the organizers, the amendments' initiators from the Ministry of Water Resources explain that there is a multitude of buildings where low-income persons allegedly live.

All other facilities are to be included as well. There are supposedly 160 thousand of them in Almaty alone.

The lobbyists of the amendments deliberately inflate their number. 

civil activist and artist Saltanat Tashimova says corrupt officials, developers, and owners of residential complexes, mansions, hotels, and restaurants built near water bodies violating the law need the legalization.

According to official data, as of 2023, there are 14,010 land plots for individual housing construction, multi-apartment residential complexes, and commercial properties located in the water protection zones in Almaty.

Environmental activists believe this is a significant amount, and they have an extremely negative impact on the state of water bodies. Instead of simply legalizing them all en masse, each object must be investigated to determine who built it, when, and what documents the owner has. 

 

This is also for the safety of the residents and visitors of all these establishments in the event of floods or mudflows. In Kazakhstan, houses in river floodplains are regularly flooded, and then it turns out that residents build where, by law, it is forbidden. 

Unfortunately, there are cases, especially in Almaty, where local executive bodies issue permits for construction in water protection zones and even strips, added Saltanat Tashimova.

When establishing red lines within which capital structures cannot be built, it is necessary to focus on the most flooded years, when rivers overflow their banks the most, experts say. 

According to the Stop Construction group, at least 36 residential complexes have been built along the river banks in Almaty alone, in addition to cottages and commercial establishments. 

Lobbyists talk about poor people who need help to legalize their property. But in Kazakhstan, ordinary people have never received land in the water protection zone. All illegal construction in Almaty was moved out under Yesimov before 2010. At that time, there were 25 houses, and all their residents were resettled, the owners were offered other options or legalized before July 1, 2009. But after Yesimov, Baibek came, and what happened next is unclear,
said Anara Tleulesova, deputy chairperson of the National Water Partnership and independent water resources expert.  

Anara Tleulesova also noted that the banks of the Bolshaya Almatinka below the second hydroelectric power station have cafes, restaurants, recreation areas, and cottages. They dump their wastewater into the river, and private houses built along the rivers do the same. 

In 2007, I came to an agreement with the Akimat, and we filled all these holes from which the waste flows into the river with concrete. So that the residents of these houses could use their own (explicit word - Ed.). Because before that, they were offered to connect to the sewer collector that comes from the Almaarasan sanatorium. But everyone refused. But when we did this, the residents began to drain everything into the river through hoses, and a little later they completely punctured their pipes,  said Anara Tleulesova.

She also recalled that in 1995, the Almaty Maslikhat decided that the water protection zone of the Bolshaya Almatinka River should be 100 meters, not 20 or 35 meters. The smaller ones were 20 meters. The Pervomayskiye ponds were 100 meters. At the Malaya Almatinka River - 50 meters. The BAK was 100 meters.

Incidentally, Majilis deputy Bakytzhan Bazarbek also drew attention to this situation several days ago. 

Almaty activists are asking officials, deputies, and public figures not to allow the adoption of this norm. 

Original Author: Danil Utyupin