Kazakhstan's Central Election Commission (CEC) registered the incumbent president and the member of the Nur Otan Party, Nursultan Nazarbayev, as a presidential candidate in an early election, RIA Novosti reported March 15 citing the CEC website.
CEC said that 560,523 valid signatures of the voters from all the 16 regions of the country were collected in support of Nazarbayev's candidacy.
Kazakhstan's ruling party - the Nur Otan Party - earlier at a congress nominated Nazarbayev as a presidential candidate.
Following that, he submitted documents to the CEC, and successfully passed an exam on the knowledge of the Kazak language, which is the state language of Kazakhstan.
The CEC allowed Nazarbayev to start collecting signatures in his support.
The decision to hold an early presidential election was made with regard to the numerous appeals by public organizations and citizens, who asked to hold the election this year, given the difficult economic situation in the world.
Aside from that, the holding of an early presidential election was justified by its coincidence in 2016 with parliamentary election.