Politics in Russia: power, lobby, conflicts. Issue No (4) 797

January 18 - 24, 2010

Main tendencies of political week

A meeting of the State Council devoted to issues of the political system improvement was the central domestic policy event last week. In his speech Dmitry Medvedev spoke in favor of retaining the system’s fundamentals. He declared that Russia’s political system was not good in all aspects but it coped with its objectives. The head of state also pointed out it was groundless to accuse the Russian election system. For instance, following results of the autumn elections the opposition claimed there had been thousands of violations but contested just several dozen episodes in courts with not all suits having chances to be satisfied. According to the president, such accusations with no evidence provided are a kind of legal nihilism.

Thus, the media campaign launched on the eve of the State Council’s meeting that had positioned the event almost as the beginning of total reformatting of the political system, failed to achieve its goals, and the Russian president quite clearly and unambiguously spoke in favor of supporting the status quo making the room for interpretation of his words minimal. It should be also pointed out that the head of state thanked UR for utmost support to his initiatives having once again confirmed the status of the ruling party.

Law enforcement agencies were under tough media pressure. The interior ministry (revival of the Dymovsky project, arrest of lieutenant colonel Maurin and the death of an Omsk journalist tortured by a policeman) and the defense ministry (mass reshuffle it the top brass) were the first bodies to have been affected, followed by the Investigation Committee of the Prosecutor General’s Office (arrest of an IC officer suspected of extorting a $15m bribe; upholding Dmitry Dovgy’s sentence and allegedly planned mass personnel cuts in the central office) and the federal prison service (justice minister’s statement about the necessity to cut the number of the service’s personnel by one third). Such coincidence makes one think that the campaign aimed at pressurizing power bodies is coordinated to some extent (although most news-making occasions emerge spontaneously) with the objective to find a “weak link” (internal Fronde) sooner or later at least in one of them.

Different opposition forces became noticeably active. In particular, amendments to the State Duma regulations stipulating a timeframe for political statements to be made by the opposition at the beginning of every morning session were submitted last week. Despite criticism of being a “cosmetic” concession to the opposition, this rule will substantially broaden possibilities of the opposition to promote itself. At the beginning of a session almost the whole parliamentary pool of journalists is present, unlike the situation at the end of the meeting; this is why loud statements of the opposition will gain maximal resonance. However, the parliamentary opposition wants much more and it has submitted a bill on parliamentary control; a tough fight around this document has already started. The non-systemic opposition also became active; leading positions in this community are being passed from liberal forces to left radicals.

Major events January 18 - 24, 2010

Volume: 14 pages