Congratulations from the rector of Shakarim University Duman Orynbekov on Victory Day

Dear Veterans of the Great Patriotic War!

Esteemed faculty, staff, and students!

May 9 - Victory Day

A date that lives not only in the calendar. It lives in the memories of families, in the destinies of generations, in the history of our country.

85 years ago, on June 22, 1941, a war began that changed the course of all world history. Millions of people went through an ordeal, the cost of which was measured by the fate of families, destroyed cities, lost youth, and the hard work of the front and rear.

Today this memory is becoming especially acute. According to official data from the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection of the Population, as of February 1, 2026, 76,059 veterans of various categories lived in Kazakhstan. Among them, today there are 69 veterans of the Great Patriotic War, 16,250 people equal in benefits to WWII veterans, 26,626 veterans of military operations on the territory of other states and 33,114 home front workers. And now in these data there are no names of war veterans of the Abay region. In 2024 there were four. ...

Behind these numbers are people, their lives and their choices, their endurance and their right to look us in the eye and ask the question: do we remember the price of peace?

For the Abay region, this memory has special significance. Tens of thousands of people left the Semipalatinsk region for the front of World War II. More than fifty Semipalatinsk residents were awarded the high title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Among them are Mukatai Abeulov, Nikolay Avdeev, Koigeldy Aukhadiev, Sergey Batinkov, Serikkazy Bekbosynov, Zakaria Belibaev, Pyotr Zheleznyakov, Aitkesh Ibraev, Kapay Iskakov, Makhmet Kairbaev, Zhangazy Moldagaliev and many other of our fellow countrymen, whose names are inscribed in the chronicle of the Victory.

This is not an abstract history, but the history of our land: Semey, Abay district, Aksuat, Beskaragai, Borodulikha, Zharma, Kokpekty, Charsk - behind each name there are people who went to the front, worked in the rear, returned to peaceful life or remained forever on the fields of war.

A special page is connected with the history of our university. In 1941, the first graduate of the Semipalatinsk State Pedagogical Institute consisted of 130 teachers. In the first months of the war, 40 teachers and 50 students of the institute went to the front.

The historical archive line became the beginning of Shakarim University’s now responsibility to the country.

The teacher who was preparing to enter the classroom yesterday became a defender. The teacher who worked with the students went to the front. The institute, which had just begun its journey, immediately became part of the great history of the country.

Today, many of our students have probably heard stories at home about their grandfathers and great-grandfathers. Someone managed to hear these stories in person. Some people know them from family photographs, letters, documents, museum materials, and books. But the form of memory does not change the main thing: we must remember.

Victory is not only a military result

This is the result of perseverance, discipline, work, inner strength and willingness to defend the country.

Today the world has again become complex and disturbing. Stability can no longer be taken for granted. The world requires a careful attitude, maturity, responsibility and the ability to understand how quickly the usual life can change.

That is why Victory Day remains not only a day of remembrance. It is a day of serious conversation about the price of peace.

Shakarim University as an educational space bears its part of the responsibility for preserving historical memory. Through knowledge. Through education. Through respect for the past. Through an honest conversation with students about how peaceful life rests on memory, work and responsibility.

Dear veterans!

Please accept the words of deep gratitude from all of us, those who remember, honor and bow their heads before your feat.

For perseverance, fortitude, the life you defended.

Words of our gratitude to you, participants of the Great Patriotic War, to those who went through the front and took the main blow.

To the home front workers - those who, in the most difficult conditions, provided the country with everything necessary, maintained production, raised the economy and worked for Victory.

To everyone who survived those years, preserved the country and gave us the right to live, study, work and develop.

How many books have not yet been written, how many destinies remain only in family memory and how many archives have not yet been opened, not read, not comprehended.

We are obliged to continue this work - to search, find, restore names and stories. Not formally, but truly, with the understanding that behind every line lies a human life.

In this connection, I propose to create a search team named after veterans who died on the battlefields. This could become the work of students, teachers, researchers, and the general work of the university.

I am sure that among our students and colleagues there are ideas that can develop into real projects - archival research, documentaries, expeditions, digital memory databases.

Memory is also work. And it needs to be done.

Let the Memory of the Victory remain part of our internal culture.

Let her teach us to take care of the world, respect our elders, work honestly and understand the value of every quiet day.

Happy Victory Day!

With respect, Duman Orynbekov