Day of Media Workers in Kazakhstan (28/06)

On June 28, representatives of the media of the Republic of Kazakhstan celebrate their professional holiday.

At first, this holiday was called Journalism Day and was celebrated in independent Kazakhstan on May 10 — on the day of the publication of the first Kazakh-language newspaper «Turkestan uayalytta newspapersin» («Turkestan Gazette») in 1870. But in 1997 it turned out that it was financed by the tsarist government. In addition, it promoted the colonization of the free Kazakh steppes«. Therefore, May 10 did not go down in the history of Kazakh journalism as a professional holiday.

Then they decided to designate June 28 as a journalistic holiday, because on this day in 1991 the first Kazakh law on the media was adopted, which was called the Law of the Kazakh SSR «On the Press and Other Media». The holiday was called Press, Radio and Television Day and was celebrated until 2012 traditionally on the last Sunday of June. And according to the Decree of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan dated October 20, 2011, its celebration was set for June 28, and the holiday also received a new name — Day of Communications and Information Workers. But in 2019, this holiday was divided into two — Communications and Information Workers Day, which is celebrated on May 17 and dedicated to World Telecommunications and Information Society Day. And June 28 is now celebrated in the Republic as Media Workers Day.

Currently, as of May 2022, there are 5,173 registered media outlets in Kazakhstan, of which 3,672 are periodicals, 191 — TV channels, 84 — radio, 948 — news agencies and online publications.

The largest group in the Republic remains print — 3672 of the total number of registered media, of which 2179 newspapers and 1493 magazines. Most often, the Kazakh and Russian languages are used in the media.

On their own professional holiday, all media workers in Kazakhstan receive congratulations from colleagues, friends and management, and the President of the country announces gratitude and awards various awards to the most distinguished of them.

987