Will the master judge them?

On July 20, reports appeared that the co-chairman of the Right Cause party, Leonid Gozman, was going to discuss the most important and pressing issues related to the future of the party directly in the Kremlin, with the First Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration, Vladislav Surkov. Interfax reported this with reference to a source in Right Cause. According to this source, Gozman is counting on the Kremlin’s help so that the party can go to the October elections to the Moscow City Duma on its own. In recent days, the prospect of negotiations between another co-chair of the party, Boris Titov, and Yabloko on a joint election list has been animatedly discussed. “Most likely, L. Gozman believes that B. Titov shows too much servile activity, wanting to please the big bosses. Therefore, Leonid Yakovlevich is probably trying to ensure that Titov is told that there is no need to overdo it and it’s time to put on the brakes,” Interfax reported the source’s words. All three co-chairs should be present at the meeting on July 21, and Gozman and Georgy Bovt, who supports him, also want to raise the issue of the unnecessaryness of unity of command in the party, which Titov insists on. For the sake of this meeting, they say, the question of participation in the October elections was postponed by the political council of the “Right Cause” from July 18 to July 22. By the way, Yabloko also moved the conference of its Moscow branch from the 20th to the 22nd.

“Right Cause” is in a fever. The co-chairing triumvirate of Bovt, Gozman and Titov, which initially seemed like the cast of characters in one of Krylov’s fables, is torn apart by disagreements. Bovt and Gozman - on the one hand, Titov - on the other. As Georgy Bovt told the Daily Journal, the initial idea of ​​the election unification with Yabloko was that within the framework of the negotiations, priority should be given to the format according to which the Yabloko party, a veteran of modern Russian politics, would go to the Moscow City Duma under the flag of the yellow-mouthed "Just cause." This strange option, at first (and not at first) glance, was indeed considered during the negotiations, but then it turned out that the flag would still be “Apple”. True, Titov plans to take first place on the election list, give third place to a party comrade, and only second place to Yabloko leader Sergei Mitrokhin. At the same time, Titov is even ready to leave Right Cause during the elections, since the law prohibits the creation of pre-election alliances and blocs from different parties, but after the elections he will return there again. Bovt and Gozman perceived this entire presented scheme with bewilderment: they would have preferred greater clarity in the plans. In their opinion, a pre-election alliance is possible only if Yabloko and Right Cause are ready to merge in ecstasy and create a single party. Titov is not satisfied with this approach, and on July 16 he complained: they say that negotiations with Yabloko on a single list are essentially completed, and suddenly Gozman puts forward an unexpected condition: the parties must make a joint statement on unification and hold a founding congress in November. And while the co-chairs of Right Cause are scolding, Yabloko is already announcing that it may well go to the elections without any Titov.