Probably the low rating of the leader of “United Russia” would reduce the deputies from the ruling party
Probably with the five that the president has chosen as leaders, he is looking for a way to calm the pandemic, the family, the army and the traditional voter who wants firmness towards the West
Probably the Russian head of state did not like the softer policy and emancipation of his successor in the Kremlin
Navalny’s investigation into the prime minister’s $ 1.2 billion property empire may have robbed him of his party love
The absence of former Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev in the federal list for the Duma elections in September is not a low assessment of his party work. This was stated by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. Such was the laconic public explanation after the big surprise announced last Saturday at a congress of the ruling United Russia party by President Putin himself.
The news of the party leader’s exclusion from the federal party list is a shock. Moreover, according to people familiar with the matter, the new leaders on the list were identified in complete secrecy, and Medvedev himself learned what was being prepared for him at the last moment and was in fact confronted with a fait accompli. Following a similar model, on November 10, 1989, Todor Zhivkov’s former associates in Bulgaria took away all his power.
As chairman of United Russia, the politician, who has been Putin’s right-hand man for years, was first on the list in both 2011 and 2016. This made it clear that he was leading the ruling party to electoral success. But not this time. Why? What is happening in Russia?
“The party is in constant motion, it is constantly being renewed and this meets with support,” Peskov explained. Many interpreted the explanation as an awkward attempt to cover up Medvedev’s humiliation. Those present at the congress revealed that he had been crushed, in an obvious bad mood.
It is true that in the top five on the list there are three names that belong to people far less tempted by politics, who could symbolize some kind of renewal. This is primarily Denis Protsenko, chief physician of the clinic for patients with COVID-19 in the Moscow suburb of Kommunarka. Shortly before the congress, in an interview, the doctor even said that he had no intention of running for parliament. But then Putin called him in person and things changed.
The other two relatively unknown names are the children’s ombudsman Ana Kuznetsova and the co-chairwoman of the All-Russian People’s Front and head of the Sirius educational center Elena Shmelyova. The leaders in the list – the Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu and the Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov, are “old muzzles” and it would be difficult to talk about the infusion of fresh blood in their case. The truth is, however, that they are currently quite popular in Russia because of their firm stance on the West.
In a Russian media ranking, Shoigu was recently named the top-ranked minister. The military chief is the only one with whom Putin shares his famous image travels as Rambo in the taiga.
As for Lavrov, he is not formally a member of United Russia, but apparently no attempt has been made to imitate the political neutrality of diplomat number one.
This is not the case with Medvedev. According to the Russian edition of Medusa, he very much hoped to be at the top of the United Russia list again, because his dream was to become head of the Duma after entering parliament – in fact, this is the second most important post in the country.
Putin not only cut him off from that dream, but did not even allow him to present the candidates as party leader, as has been the case so far in Congress. Instead, the president himself went to the rostrum and read the names, leaving no doubt that the decision for the top five was his alone.
It is no secret that the strong man in the Kremlin has long been dissatisfied with the work, and probably with the personal devotion of his former close ally. This became clear last year, when Medvedev and the entire government unexpectedly resigned as outside observers, and former tax chief Mikhail Mishustin was appointed prime minister. All this happened only a day after Putin asked the Federal Assembly for key changes in the constitution, which in practice later gave him the opportunity to rule until 2036, when he will be 84. In this cast, Medvedev was appointed to the sinecure position Deputy Chief of the Security Council of Russia, created especially for him.
According to the BBC, the former prime minister’s anti-rating is among the main reasons for his absence from the lists. A few months before the parliamentary elections, he garnered 66.6% disapproval, and his ruling party has the lowest support in years.
Putin is unlikely to like this situation in the troubled times of the coronavirus crisis and Moscow’s isolation on the international stage. Moreover
the new composition of
The state
word will
is responsible for
presidential
elections
in 2024, to which, after amendments to the constitution, Putin will again have the right to appear. Despite the almost one-man regime, the strong man in the Kremlin will still need a solid presence of his party in parliament, which Medvedev’s leadership cannot provide.
With the new top five, the president is trying to give the party wider public support – the army (through Shoigu), supporters of a firm stance towards the West (through Lavrov), those grateful to the fighters against the invisible evil – the coronavirus (through Protsenko), fans of the traditional family (through Kuznetsova, who is a mother of many children) and civil society as the Kremlin imagines it (through Shmelyova), the BBC commented. In addition, Shoigu and Lavrov are very popular among the older generation, ie. they hold the hard electorate firmly. The main loser of all this is Medvedev.
Denis Volkov of the Levada Center commented that Medvedev was too unpopular and that Russian political life was already tired of him. Many consider him extremely uncharismatic. It is also recalled that a few years ago, opposition leader Alexei Navalny exposed the former prime minister’s secret property empire for about $ 1.2 billion and described in detail the corruption schemes through which it was created.
But there is something else. Since Medvedev became president, Putin’s attitude toward him has become rather ambiguous. He never seemed to be able to forgive him that while he was in the Kremlin, his close ally and friend tried to pursue a slightly more emancipated policy, and some circles in the country and abroad began to view him as a softer and more liberal version of the Russian autocratic model. Ie Medvedev had a chance to become a real competitor for the supreme power. But before the second term in the 2011 elections, he voluntarily refused to run and cleared the way for Putin.
This is the reason why the current head of state always keeps Medvedev close to the abundant state feeder, but isolating him more and more from the possibility of real influence, such as his entry into parliament and his eventual election as head of the Duma.
Radev behind Macron and Merkel for a meeting with the Russian leader, Poland and Lithuania – against
A number of EU leaders flatly rejected a proposal by France and Germany on Friday to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin to normalize relations, the Financial Times reported. The idea met strong opposition from Poland and the Baltic states, but was accepted by Bulgarian President Rumen Radev. The Netherlands and Sweden have also expressed caution.
“Bulgaria supports the initiative of France and Germany to conduct a direct dialogue with Russia, in which solutions to open issues will be sought,” Rumen Radev said in Brussels after attending the European Council. The head of state stressed that this is also about the level of the EU’s ambition to be a factor or an observer on a global scale. According to him, realism is needed in geopolitics and it is no coincidence that at the last European Council he expressed the position that seven years of sanctions have not led to the desired results and therefore it is necessary to look for new tools to develop relations with Russia.
However, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki believes that such talks would only be possible if Russia abandons its aggressive policy towards its neighbors.
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda, on the other hand, was more extreme and said that the idea of Germany and France was “to try to lure the bear to keep the pot of honey.”
One of the initiators of the meeting, French President Emmanuel Macron, believes it would be a chance to resume dialogue with the EU’s biggest neighbor.
Speaking in the Bundestag before the Brussels meeting, Angela Merkel said the EU should seek direct contact with Russia in the same way as the United States.
– .
