Translated material
Lord of the Ether
Georgy Boos establishes teleconferences with the population
On July 5, First Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration of the Russian Federation Vladislav Surkov held a regular meeting dedicated to the problems of the Kaliningrad region. The discussion was, in particular, about the functioning, regulation and administration of regional customs (its Kaliningrad governor Georgy Boos wants to “lock it” to Moscow, not St. Petersburg), as well as about the mechanism for subsidizing air transportation (see "Vremya Novostey" from June 16) . Mr. Boos himself, on the eve of the end of his first gubernatorial term, is intensifying direct contacts with the population through television - he recently held a multi-hour teleconference with the population. And he promises to hold the next one in three months, that is, he actually directly makes it clear that he expects to retain his post.Georgiy Boos's term of office expires in September 2010. It is quite natural that it was through the prism of intrigue around the reappointment of Mr. Boos for a second term that the three-hour teleconference that the head of the region arranged the other day was assessed. This teleconference is already the second for the Kaliningrad governor. He held the first on March 20, a critical day for the regional authorities, on which the next protest rally was scheduled. Previous protests turned out to be so massive (at the end of January, according to the Department of Internal Affairs, 10 thousand people came out to the Central Square of Kaliningrad) that Moscow became worried: is the local leadership adequate, is it monitoring the situation in the region? This is how the idea of a teleconference came about as a way to take people off the streets and switch their attention to the blue screen. Along the way, the regional authorities managed to almost completely erode the so-called opposition coalition. Its representatives, one might say, were strangled in an embrace, invited to various joint commissions, working groups, advisory councils, meetings and round tables.
Customs was named as one of the main culprits in the difficult situation in Kaliningrad, the peak of which was the recent protests. This department does not agree with this assessment of its activities. But numerous oppositionists received a platform for speeches and are now perceived as guardians of Mr. Boos, demonstrating concern for his present and future. Some explain it this way: “We have established contact with this governor, but if a new one comes, will he communicate with us?”
The new or old governor is due to be appointed in September. This issue is still up in the air; Presidential Plenipotentiary Representative in the Northwestern Federal District Ilya Klebanov, who visited the region in June, refused to discuss the sensitive topic. The closer autumn is, the more tense the situation in the region. The regional prosecutor's office recently announced, for example, that a criminal case has been opened against the governor's assistant - he is suspected of providing a false higher education diploma. The assistant himself states that this is an error, which, of course, will be fixed.
During the teleconference, however, this was not discussed. It generally caused less excitement than the previous one (and the level of emotionality turned out to be noticeably lower - in particular, due to the fact that the famous capital’s television and radio journalist Vladimir Solovyov, who hosted the first teleconference, did not come to Kaliningrad this time). However, the list of topics for discussion turned out to be basically the same - they were not talking about the democratization of power, but mainly about “daily bread.” The governor, in particular, was asked about problems with sewerage and hot water, complained about the rudeness of officials, low salaries of nurses and extortions in schools, proposed to open a factory for the production of Jerusalem artichoke (Jerusalem artichoke is a perennial herbaceous plant, many edible cylindrical tubers are formed on its underground shoots , pear-shaped or round in shape with a pleasant sweetish taste), were interested in the price of gas and air tickets, and discussed the fate of the regional airline. Among the program topics - please combat corruption. “The presence of a small number of systemic issues means that all the actions we take are correct,” noted one Kaliningrad official.