Thousands of Kazakh drivers are losing their licenses through court orders, with a record number of lawsuits filed in the first half of 2026. Courts of first instance received 5,336 lawsuits seeking revocation or suspension of driving rights during January–June 2026 — 3.7 times more than in the same period of 2025 and the highest in at least a decade, according to data from the Committee on Legal Statistics and Special Records of the General Prosecutor’s Office of Kazakhstan, as reported by Data Hub and cited by infohub.kz.
The sharp rise has been observed for the third consecutive year. Police officials initiate the proceedings, and spikes in activity correspond to public debates over oversight of driving schools. Since April 22, 2016, driving schools have only been required to submit a notification to open, instead of obtaining a mandatory license and being entered into a register of educational organizations.
Among the grounds for court-ordered license revocation are the issuance of a driver’s license in violation of driver training regulations, exam procedures, or document processing. Another reason: if a driver fails to pass a traffic rules exam within two months after being ordered to retake it, their license can be revoked.
The highest number of lawsuits were filed in Almaty and Aktobe region — 757 each. They were followed by Karaganda region with 535 cases. These three regions accounted for 38% of all cases nationwide. The fewest such lawsuits were recorded in Astana, with only 13 cases, or 0.2% of the national total.
Of the 5,336 lawsuits filed, proceedings were initiated in 5,161 cases. Courts considered 4,251 cases: in 4,044 instances the claims were granted, and in 207 they were denied. Thus, in the vast majority of cases, the driver did lose their right to drive after court action.
The situation with driving school oversight has already prompted legislative change. Starting January 1, 2027, Kazakhstan will reintroduce a licensing requirement for driving schools. Whether this will reduce the flood of lawsuits remains to be seen in future statistics. Earlier, the publication Kursiv Avto reported that the Ministry of Internal Affairs proposed using biometrics and geolocation to monitor driving school attendance. It also reported that Kazakh citizens can drive in the United Arab Emirates using their domestic driver’s licenses.