| Her presidential election campaign will be financed by Yukos shareholder Leonid Nevzlin Yesterday, co-chairman of the Union of Right Forces Irina Khakamada, speaking to journalists for the first time in her new status as a presidential candidate, announced that her election campaign would be financed by the largest shareholder of the Yukos oil company, Leonid Nevzlin. Until yesterday, the former rector of the Russian State Humanitarian University Leonid Nevzlin served as deputy chairman of the board of the Open Russia society, which is an affiliated structure of YUKOS. However, yesterday he resigned due to the fact that he decided to support Khakamada in the elections. “I am resigning from the post of Deputy Chairman of the Board of the Regional Public Organization “Open Russia”, since participation in politics does not correspond to the nature of the activities of this charitable organization. I have decided to support the only representative of the democratic forces of our country, Irina Khakamada, in the upcoming presidential elections in Russia. Those of the Open Russia employees who, in accordance with their convictions, intend to take part in the election struggle, also leave their jobs at Open Russia,” Mr. Nevzlin said in a statement issued yesterday. According to Khakamada, the co-owner of Yukos called on colleagues from Open Russia to join her election campaign.
Khakamada told reporters about another of her sponsors - a certain 82-year-old woman who collected 30 thousand rubles from friends. and sent them to the Khakamada support fund.
It is not yet known whether other major businessmen besides Nevzlin will be willing to invest their money in the “challenge to President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin,” which, by her own admission, Khakamada is throwing. Her “Address to Citizens Victims of State Terrorism,” published yesterday in a number of media outlets, was perceived by the expert community as a sharp and unexpected attack against the president, which could make Khakamada’s participation in the elections impossible.
However, despite the harsh criticism of the president, the co-chairman of the Union of Right Forces does not even verbally expect to take away his victory, modestly defining second place as his goal.
At its congress on January 24, the Union of Right Forces will decide whether to support Khakamada in the elections. Party leader Boris Nemtsov has already spoken out in favor of the right-wingers lending their collective shoulder to their colleagues. However, it is likely that the other co-chairs of the Union of Right Forces, Yegor Gaidar and Anatoly Chubais, will prefer to avoid open confrontation with Putin, to which Ms. Khakamada’s support condemns them.
The issue of supporting Khakamada was also considered at the Yabloko party congress held at the end of last year, and the Yabloko members decided not to participate in the presidential elections in any way. However, despite this, Khakamada stated that she considers herself “the single candidate of the democratic forces, whose nomination the SPS and Yabloko could not agree on on the eve of the presidential elections.” At the same time, if the Union of Right Forces decides to refuse to support her, Khakamada promises to suspend his membership in the party.
Currently, Irina Khakamada’s PR campaign is led by Marina Litvinovich, who was the creative director of the SPS election headquarters. Ksenia VERETENNIKOVA |
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