ASTANA (Reuters) — Dariga Nazarbayeva, the eldest daughter of former Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, was elected speaker of the upper house of parliament on Wednesday, the N°2 position in the nation’s political hierarchy.

Dariga Nazarbayeva

The previous speaker, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, has taken over as president in line with the constitution after Nazarbayev abruptly resigned on Tuesday.

Nazarbayeva was born at Temirtau in 1963. At one point she worked as head of the official state-run news agency, Khabar. She formed the Kazakh political party Asar, Kazakh for “All together”. Asar merged with the pro-Nazarbayev party Otan in July 2006.

On 3 April 2014 Nazarbayeva was elected as Vice Chairman of the Majlis. On 11 September 2015 she was named Deputy Prime Minister. A year later, on 13 September 2016, she was appointed to the Senate; she was designated as head of the Senate’s International Affairs, Defence, and Security Committee.