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Fast Money & Foreign Objects
Rich Kazakhs Revive Polygamy as Women Seek Poverty Escape
By Nariman Gizitdinov - Dec 3, 2013 2:10 AM ET
Given the choice between love and money, Samal, a tall, curly-haired 23-year-old woman from a village in southern Kazakhstan, would take the cash.
Struggling to pay rent and tuition on her salary as a waitress in Almaty, the Kazakh commercial capital, Samal says she’d drop her boyfriend in a heartbeat if a wealthy older man offered to make her his second wife.
“Becoming a tokal would be a fairy tale,” Samal says during a break at the cafe where she works, using the Kazakh word for the youngest of two wives, who traditionally gets her own apartment, car and monthly allowance.
The gulf between rich and poor “exploded” in Kazakhstan, the world’s largest uranium supplier and the second-largest oil producer in the former Soviet Union, after independence in 1991 and the gap hasn’t closed, said Gulmira Ileuova, head of the Center for Social and Political Research Strategy in Almaty. President Nursultan Nazarbayev, in power for more than two decades, undertook a state asset-sale program in the 1990s that enriched a group of insiders at everyone else’s expense, Ileuova said by phone on Nov. 27.
That gap is fueling a revival of polygamy, which has become a status symbol for affluent men and a ticket out of poverty for young women. The practice flourished in this Central Asian nation for centuries, first as part of its nomadic culture and later under Islamic Sharia law, until the Bolsheviks outlawed it in 1921. The trend has spawned two best-selling novels and a television talk show.
Polygyny, Polyandry
“It’s become prestigious to have a tokal,” Ayan Kudaikulova, an Almaty socialite and author of one of those novels, said in an interview in her cafe, surrounded by purple walls and bearskin rugs. “They’re like Breguet luxury watches,” Kudaikulova said, wearing a red Alexander McQueen pantsuit and an Alain Silberstein timepiece. “Unfortunately, not having a junior wife is now shameful for wealthy men.”
Before the Soviets took over following the 1917 Russian Revolution, many rich Kazakhs would buy second wives from parents, often with livestock, which helped spread wealth. Those unions were governed both by common law and Sharia. Polygamy is still technically illegal, though there’s no prescribed punishment for it as there is in neighboring Kyrgyzstan, where the maximum penalty is two years in prison.
Kazakh lawmakers have tried to legalize polygyny, having two or more wives, at least twice since 2001, most recently in 2008, when the measure failed after a female parliamentarian insisted on including polyandry, or multiple husbands, as well.
Women’s Rights
More than 40 countries, almost all in Asia and Africa, still recognize polygamous marriages, even though the United Nations said in a report in 2009 that the practice “violates women’s human rights and infringes their right to dignity.”
A poll published last year by state-owned news service Kazinform found 41 percent of Kazakhstan’s 17 million people favored legalizing polygamy. Twenty-six percent said they opposed it, 22 percent had no preference and 11 percent thought it would be a waste of time because the practice already exists, according to Kazinform.
The Spiritual Department for Muslims of Kazakhstan, a Almaty-based nongovernmental group that operates most of the country’s mosques, said it urges all young men to marry and start a family. If a man wants to have a second wife and hold a religious wedding ceremony, called Nikah, in a mosque, the senior wife must attend to ensure all parties are in agreement, the department said in an e-mailed reply to questions.
Mosque Marriage
About 10 percent of all Nikah ceremonies in Almaty’s largest mosque now involve tokals, according to a senior cleric who asked not to be identified because the practice isn’t officially recognized. More than 3,000 couples will get married at the main mosque this year, about 30 percent more than in 2008, the cleric said.
“Tokalism has started to become noticeable,” said Ileuova of the Center for Social and Political Research Strategy. “That’s in part because 50 percent of the population is poor.”
Kazakhstan has enjoyed an oil boom that has boosted gross domestic product about 12-fold in the past two decades, to about $200 billion last year, though even Nazarbayev, the son of a shepherd, admits that the expansion hasn’t benefited everyone.
“The question is not how we develop the level of GDP per capita,” Nazarbayev, 73, said in televised comments in April. “We must see how many people we have in poverty, the gap between rich and poor. The gap is significant.”
By Nariman Gizitdinov - Dec 3, 2013 2:10 AM ET
Given the choice between love and money, Samal, a tall, curly-haired 23-year-old woman from a village in southern Kazakhstan, would take the cash.
Struggling to pay rent and tuition on her salary as a waitress in Almaty, the Kazakh commercial capital, Samal says she’d drop her boyfriend in a heartbeat if a wealthy older man offered to make her his second wife.
“Becoming a tokal would be a fairy tale,” Samal says during a break at the cafe where she works, using the Kazakh word for the youngest of two wives, who traditionally gets her own apartment, car and monthly allowance.
The gulf between rich and poor “exploded” in Kazakhstan, the world’s largest uranium supplier and the second-largest oil producer in the former Soviet Union, after independence in 1991 and the gap hasn’t closed, said Gulmira Ileuova, head of the Center for Social and Political Research Strategy in Almaty. President Nursultan Nazarbayev, in power for more than two decades, undertook a state asset-sale program in the 1990s that enriched a group of insiders at everyone else’s expense, Ileuova said by phone on Nov. 27.
That gap is fueling a revival of polygamy, which has become a status symbol for affluent men and a ticket out of poverty for young women. The practice flourished in this Central Asian nation for centuries, first as part of its nomadic culture and later under Islamic Sharia law, until the Bolsheviks outlawed it in 1921. The trend has spawned two best-selling novels and a television talk show.
Polygyny, Polyandry
“It’s become prestigious to have a tokal,” Ayan Kudaikulova, an Almaty socialite and author of one of those novels, said in an interview in her cafe, surrounded by purple walls and bearskin rugs. “They’re like Breguet luxury watches,” Kudaikulova said, wearing a red Alexander McQueen pantsuit and an Alain Silberstein timepiece. “Unfortunately, not having a junior wife is now shameful for wealthy men.”
Before the Soviets took over following the 1917 Russian Revolution, many rich Kazakhs would buy second wives from parents, often with livestock, which helped spread wealth. Those unions were governed both by common law and Sharia. Polygamy is still technically illegal, though there’s no prescribed punishment for it as there is in neighboring Kyrgyzstan, where the maximum penalty is two years in prison.
Kazakh lawmakers have tried to legalize polygyny, having two or more wives, at least twice since 2001, most recently in 2008, when the measure failed after a female parliamentarian insisted on including polyandry, or multiple husbands, as well.
Women’s Rights
More than 40 countries, almost all in Asia and Africa, still recognize polygamous marriages, even though the United Nations said in a report in 2009 that the practice “violates women’s human rights and infringes their right to dignity.”
A poll published last year by state-owned news service Kazinform found 41 percent of Kazakhstan’s 17 million people favored legalizing polygamy. Twenty-six percent said they opposed it, 22 percent had no preference and 11 percent thought it would be a waste of time because the practice already exists, according to Kazinform.
The Spiritual Department for Muslims of Kazakhstan, a Almaty-based nongovernmental group that operates most of the country’s mosques, said it urges all young men to marry and start a family. If a man wants to have a second wife and hold a religious wedding ceremony, called Nikah, in a mosque, the senior wife must attend to ensure all parties are in agreement, the department said in an e-mailed reply to questions.
Mosque Marriage
About 10 percent of all Nikah ceremonies in Almaty’s largest mosque now involve tokals, according to a senior cleric who asked not to be identified because the practice isn’t officially recognized. More than 3,000 couples will get married at the main mosque this year, about 30 percent more than in 2008, the cleric said.
“Tokalism has started to become noticeable,” said Ileuova of the Center for Social and Political Research Strategy. “That’s in part because 50 percent of the population is poor.”
Kazakhstan has enjoyed an oil boom that has boosted gross domestic product about 12-fold in the past two decades, to about $200 billion last year, though even Nazarbayev, the son of a shepherd, admits that the expansion hasn’t benefited everyone.
“The question is not how we develop the level of GDP per capita,” Nazarbayev, 73, said in televised comments in April. “We must see how many people we have in poverty, the gap between rich and poor. The gap is significant.”
