As the highest-ranking official in the country, the president also chairs the National Security Council with the powers and responsibilities of the office are outlined in a special section of the Constitution of Kazakhstan.

Presidential elections in Kazakhstan have faced criticism, with concerns raised by Western observers regarding ballot tampering, voter fraud, harassment of opposition candidates, and media restrictions.

The former standard, which was used from 1995–2012, was a light blue rectangle there with a golden circle in which the figure of the young Kazakh leader Sakas riding a snow leopard.

[5] According to this act, the first president possesses total, absolute and termless immunity for all actions he performs while in office, and that he remains a government official until his death.

[10] At the inauguration ceremony the re-elected president assured the nation that he would continue the 5 institutional reforms that he had offered earlier, which would contribute to the consistent growth and development of the country.

[10] On January 25, 2017, President Nursultan Nazarbayev laid the groundwork for reforms to the constitution that would redistribute executive powers to the parliament and ministries for the purpose of more open and efficient governance.

[11] The Presidential Administration of the Republic of Kazakhstan (Kazakh: Қазақстан Республикасы Президентінің Әкімшілігі/Russian: Администрация Президента Республики Казахстан) reports directly to the president and aids him/her in their everyday dates.

[12] The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and other international monitors criticised the election as unfair, with issues noted including the closure of media outlets critical of the government and the jailing of opposition activists.

[13] OSCE spokesperson Cornelia Jonker criticised the lack of a "genuine choice" for voters and also argued that there were "significant restrictions to the freedom of expression.