Born: 7 January 1956 in the village of Mikhailovka in the Sverdlovsk District of Zhambyl Oblast. He is a Kazakh of the Greater Horde.

1978 -- completes studies at Kazakhstan's V. I. Lenin Polytechnic Institute

1978-80 -- engineer, senior engineer in automation department of Kazakh Scientific Research Institute

1980-82 -- works in Minsk department of the KGB

1982-86 -- officer in KGB in Stavropol Kraj

1986-93 -- officer, departmental chief, deputy director, departmental director of UKGB in Alma-Ata Oblast

1993-97 -- deputy chief, departmental chief, chief of counterintelligence division of the National Security Committee (KNB) of Kazakhstan

1997-98 -- chief of KNB in Pavlodar Province

September 1998-present -- deputy chairman of KNB while simultaneously, in 1998-99, director of Barlau foreign-intelligence agency

November-December 2001 -- first deputy chairman of KNB

December 2001-present -- KNB chairman