Astana, 4 November, . The Government has dismissed Viktoriya Shegai as vice minister of labour and social protection and appointed Ainur Abdyrakhmanova to the post, while the head of SK-Pharmacy, Nurlybek Assylbekov, has become vice minister of health, the Government press service said.
Abdyrakhmanova, born in 1984, has spent her whole career in social protection: she started in 2005 at the employment department of Korgalzhyn district and from 2024 headed the ministry’s social assistance department. Assylbekov, born in 1966, headed Shymkent’s health department, was deputy chairman of the pharmacy committee and from July 2025 ran SK-Pharmacy, the single distributor of medicines for free medical care. The Government gave no reasons for the appointments.
Shegai had held the post since June 2025. As BES.media recalls, in June 2026 she called the story of an Almaty mother working as a courier with a baby in her arms “a matter of the family budget and family relations”.
What it means: The labour ministry has a specialist in social assistance as vice minister, and the health ministry has gained the manager who was responsible for medicine procurement.
Who benefits: Recipients of social assistance, if the new vice minister knows the system from the inside; who will replace Assylbekov at SK-Pharmacy has not been announced.
Background: Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov, as Tengrinews writes, shortly before the appointment again urged the head of SK-Pharmacy to work honestly and prevent corruption.
