Scandal at the Atyrau Oil Refinery: Tokayev was complained about the general director, and KazMunayGas initiated an inspection

Deputy General Director and Chief Engineer of the Atyrau Oil Refinery Adilet Shoshanbasov addressed President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, as well as the Minister of Energy of the Republic of Kazakhstan and KazMunayGas JSC. In his letter, he made serious accusations against the head of the LLP Galymzhan Zhusanbaev.

In particular, the letter notes the director’s unacceptable behavior towards employees and the use of alcohol in the workplace.

Shoshanbasov emphasized that the last straw was the emergency shutdown of one of the units at the plant, which could have caused people to die.

“On February 15 at 05:10 at the Atyrau Refinery installation, the circulation compressor 20-S-001 stopped due to high temperature on the bearing of the high-speed gearbox shaft. The increase in bearing temperature reached alarm levels as early as February 9, and management was notified of this problem. Instead of taking safe measures, General Director Galymzhan Zhusanbaev ordered to cordon off the installation and request explanatory notes, interfering with the work of the staff and causing panic.”

According to the chief engineer of the enterprise, this situation could lead to disastrous consequences.

“This could lead to a fire, explosion, loss of life, etc. These actions were brought to my attention, and I even had to cancel my business trip to the city of Almaty.”

He paid special attention to cases of insults and humiliation by Galymzhan Zhusanbaev. According to him, the director forced his guards to use physical force to force the staff out of the plant. All this was recorded on video.

In addition, Adilet Shoshanbasov highlighted other internal problems of the enterprise. According to him, since the appointment of the general director, 15 advisers from outside the staff have been hired at the plant, but at the same time they received high fees from the payroll fund.

JSC NC KazMunayGas has already responded to the situation. They stated that a special commission will take up the issue in the near future.

“According to the facts regarding the situation at the Atyrau oil refinery, set out in recent publications on social networks, JSC NC KazMunayGas reports that all information has been accepted for study. A special commission will soon conduct a detailed inspection of the enterprise,” the national company reported.

Meanwhile, Galymzhan Zhusanbaev himself believes that the plant was sabotaged.

“They say (the authors) that I sit in the office from morning to night and drink. You can see how I personally ran when we couldn’t heat up the fuel oil installation. They do sabotage, stop the fuel oil. They wanted to stop the plant. I raised the RMC in 10 hours, and we made it with our own hands. Then they stopped the compressor yesterday. I woke up at five in the morning and arrived. They have nothing left against me, so they scare me. Don’t be afraid, nothing will happen. A criminal case has been opened. Therefore, they have no other choice,” he said in the video.

The General Director urges people not to believe the rumors and assures that the situation will be clarified during the investigation.