Father exposes son's plot

The President of Bashkortostan, Murtaza Rakhimov, revealed the conspiracy in his own parliament. Today, at a special closed session, he said that a group of deputies representing the fuel and energy complex of the republic is “engaged in intrigue and behind-the-scenes fuss in order to install their own person as head of parliament, having previously removed the current speaker, Konstantin Tolkachev, from this post.”

It must be said that the fuel and energy complex of the republic is Bashneft, Bashneftekhim and Bashkirenergo. By a strange coincidence, until recently the chairman of the board of directors of all these companies was the son of President Rakhimov, Ural.

Shortly before the election of President Rakhimov, the entire Bashkir oil industry disappeared from state property. And just recently, Mr. Rakhimov Jr. left his posts in the oil industry, and in Bashkiria they started talking about the fact that President Rakhimov was preparing a “successor” operation. They say that this Thursday Rakhimov Jr. will be elected head of parliament, and the Bashkir Family already has an oil industry.

Apparently, the Kremlin heard about these plans and talked with the president of the republic. We had a good talk. The result was an amazing message about a conspiracy by representatives of the Bashkir fuel and energy complex. It must be assumed that these were the same conspirators who stole the fuel and energy complex from state property.

What can I say? The Kremlin should have worried earlier. And deal not with YUKOS, but with Bashneft. Not because the theft of Bashneft and Bashneftekhim is an even more egregious case than loans-for-shares auctions. But because Khodorkovsky’s activities did not threaten the integrity of Russia. And the activities of the ruling Bashkir clan, which explains to the Kremlin that only it is able to control religious extremism in the republic and that it itself gradually encourages this extremism, is threatening.

If Bashneft were owned by Exxon, YUKOS, or, to hell with it, at least Mr. Sechin, there would simply be no threat of separatism. There would be no economic basis for it.