In 2019 I started to write my political thriller novel "The Outcast Presidents." I finished writing it and published it in June 2021. The story is about a fictional Central Asian country of Dalabistan that is marred by tribal inequality (a system that is a mixture of clan authoritarianism and apartheid), corruption, and economic stagnation. My protagonist named Alisher Karabars, a member of an unprivileged tribe, left Dalabistan to become a successful billionaire in California. His life is spent on partying, vapid one night stands, and abusing his employees. However, Alisher’s life is about to change. As his country's dictatorship announces new oppressive measures, the playboy businessman expands his American business’s operations to his native country. But he never expected to later become the top employer of poor compatriots in a country in a troubling situation. And, unfortunately for Alisher, the country’s dictator sees Alisher as a threat to power. Alisher’s failure to stand up against the dictatorship will result in his and his compatriots’ lives being at grave danger. The dictator's decision resulted in unprecedented massive protests in that country that resulted in violence and drove the conflict & plot forward.
Little did I expect that in January I would see my country of Kazakhstan having many of the scenes from my novel's pages happen in real life. On January 2, the protests started peacefully over an overnight two-fold increase in fuel prices. On January 4, my hometown became an epicenter of the protests when a large crowd came to show solidarity with the protesters on the other end of this vast country. They were met with authorities throwing stun grenades and firing tear gas to disperse the crowd, leading to clashes between police and protesters. The most extreme protesters who were unidentified provocateurs started to vandalize shops, storm government buildings (in a style more violent than January 6 on Capitol Hill), city hall, TV channel offices, police stations, and airport.
The President of Kazakhstan declared that Kazakhstan was under an external attack from terrorist groups with international links and asked Collective Security Treaty Organization (Russian analogue of NATO that consists of Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan) for military assistance.
Those who remained on the square on 6 January tried to hold a peaceful rally, among them many elderly men and women who were seeking an end to the shooting. The protesters held a banner saying: "We are not terrorists, we are peaceful people." But that evening soldiers arrived in armored vehicles and blocked the square from both sides. The President gave an order to shoot without warning. At least 225 people were killed according to official data. More than 7,000 were arrested, many of whom risk various jail sentences (from couple of years to lifetime imprisonment).
Peaceful protesters, activists and journalists were confused with looters and bandits during these days. The Internet was shut down for a week in the entire country. Banks were not working for even further. Cryptocurrency prices faced a dip since cryptocurrency mining facilities in Kazakhstan (that process 20% of world's Bitcoin, 2nd in the world right now after USA) were shut down due to Internet outage.
When few weeks later I looked back at this situation in my country, I found many similarities between this January's events in my city and the events in my fictional country from my novel:
- Protesters storming & taking control of government buildings
- Military & special forces being involved and shooting at civilians & suspected marauders without warning
- The most violent and extreme protesters decapitating some police officers
- Foreign troops involved in the protests, although in my novel they allied with the protesters while in Kazakhstan the foreign troops backed the government
- Initially the protest movements in both countries were started by the working class & educated students but then caught on to encompass the general population tired of corruption, as well as involving a violent loid minority willing to die, kill, and marauder
- Both countries experienced unprecedented protests after many becoming tired of poverty in a country blessed with natural resources and people not being able to bear socioeconomic inequality anymore
I told about this observation to my father on a call. He thought about it and replied that I possibly foresaw events of 2022 in Kazakhstan.
That made me remember that back in 2019, I sought one college application company to help me to apply to US universities. Later I discovered its business practices that were highly corrupt even by Kazakh standards like forging essays, records, volunteer experiences while destroying self-esteem of students and parents. It was run by the wife of a top Kazakh dissident. I told her about my novel when preparing for US college applications. When I initially told her and other individuals about my novel and its basic synopsis, they were excited.
But when they read my first manuscript, they told me that my book is “of nothing” and that I “do not understand anything about politics.” In addition to that, they thought that my novel has a typical happy ending and is an idealist nonsense that ends in love and peace. However, my book is everything but that. My first thoughts were “If you think this has a happy ending, you haven’t been paying attention” and “You know nothing, Jon Snow.”
Perhaps time has shown who was actually right. Maybe I foresaw these events in Kazakhstan earlier, or it was a coincidence, or the possible causes of the eventual explosion of the social time-bomb were too obvious to notice?
Readers and authors of Reddit, did anyone else experience a similar situation?
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