In 2021, the Presidential Property Management Department approached Kum-Shagyl with a request to supply reinforced concrete products worth approximately $500,000 free of charge for the construction of Sadyr Japarov’s new residence. However, the request exceeded the company’s capabilities. The plant apologized and said that it could not help.

The municipality transferred the crushed stone quarry to the Presidential Property Management Department

Kum-Shagyl is owned by 46 shareholders. Many worked there during the Soviet Union and bought out the plant’s shares before 1993. The plant has leased two nearby crushed stone quarries from the Bishkek mayor’s office since the 1990s.

The lease agreement for one of the quarries expired at the beginning of 2021. When Sadyr Japarov came to power, Kum-Shagyl submitted another application for an extension. But the Bishkek mayor’s office suddenly began to delay the process, and in 2023 the municipality transferred the quarry to the Presidential Property Management Department for indefinite use.

It is unprofitable to make reinforced concrete without crushed stone, so the shareholders had no choice but to sell the plant to the new owners of the quarry. But Sadyr Japarov’s people wanted to take the plant for free.

Officials forced the director to sign an agreement on the transfer of the plant

In October 2023, the main shareholder Vladimir Popov was summoned "for a talk" to the Presidential Property Management Department. Returning to the plant, Popov said that they had threatened his daughter and grandchildren.

Afterwards, the officials took the general director of Kum-Shagyl, Anuar Atabiyev, to a private notary to sign a preliminary agreement on the transfer of the plant. But the notary called their actions illegal and demanded that they present the decision of the shareholders’ meeting.

Then Atabiyev was taken to the Bishkek State Register. The contract was registered there.

But the preliminary agreement on the transfer of the plant had no legal force: Kum-Shagyl is owned not by the director, but by dozens of shareholders, who cancelled the decision, not wanting to give the plant to the mayor’s office.

According to the lawyer for the shareholders of Kum-Shagyl, Lyudmila Sabelnikova, officials are now hunting for shareholders and intimidating them.

The authorities accused the plant of causing damage to the environment, but the State Environmental and Technical Supervision Service found no violations

On February 8, 2024, the plant was seized with the personal participation of Mayor Aibek Dzhunushaliev and Presidential Property Management Director Kanybek Tumanbaev.

Sabelnikov’s lawyer recalls that when asked to show documents confirming the authority to close a private enterprise, Dzhunushaliev replied: “We are here, and that’s enough!”

In order to somehow justify the takeover, the authorities decided to retroactively accuse the enterprise of causing damage to the environment - sometimes this allows the state to appoint an external manager even to a private enterprise. But this norm applies to concessions where there is a state share, and in Kum-Shagyl there is none. In addition, on February 20, the State Environmental and Technical Supervision Authority inspected the plant and did not find any serious environmental violations.

However, on February 29, a temporary manager was appointed at Kum-Shagyl anyway. It was Tumanbaev’s fellow countryman Ermek Kutmanov.
He immediately removed the plant’s management and began pushing the workers to resign.

The head of the Union of Builders, Askarbek Moldobaev, does not understand how workers could be kicked out of a private plant if it has legal owners. "The decision on a temporary manager should be made by a meeting of shareholders. And what does the government have to do with this?" he wonders.

Why do the Kyrgyz authorities need the Kum-Shagyl plant?

In a conversation with Kloop, one of the shareholders suggested that Tumanbayev needs the quarry and the plant to receive reinforced concrete products for free. However, due to a reduction in salaries, plant specialists are leaving, which has caused interruptions in deliveries to state customers.

The Kum-Shagyl plant with quarries occupies almost 70 hectares in the 12th microdistrict. There is relatively clean air, mountains, the American University of Central Asia and elite high-rise buildings nearby. There is a botanical garden nearby. If the land is cleared and sold for development, the raiders will make good money.

Kloop sent requests to the Bishkek City Hall, the Cabinet of Ministers, the State Committee for National Security, the Prosecutor General’s Office, the State Property Agency, and the Presidential Property Management Department.