| Politicians and experts tried to present the new parliament Politicians and political scientists gathered yesterday at a meeting of the Open Forum club to share their thoughts on the future Duma: what it will be like, who will join whom in a coalition, what issues will be on the agenda and what scenarios for the country’s development all this will ultimately lead to. Director of the Center for Political Technologies Igor Bunin suggested that the monster party United Russia will have to, willy-nilly, enter into coalitions to resolve constitutional issues, which by law require 300 parliamentary votes. President of the Politika Foundation Vyacheslav Nikonov did not agree with his colleague. In his opinion, the future Duma will not consider special constitutional issues, except, perhaps, the consolidation of the subjects of the federation. According to the political scientist, United Russia will occupy more than 40% of the seats in parliament based on the list alone, which means that the need and expediency of coalitions will no longer exist. “I don't expect any dramatic changes in the legislative agenda. I don’t expect amendments to tighten criminal legislation. But the possibility of reforming law enforcement agencies seems quite real to me,” Nikonov said.
Deputy head of the Yabloko faction in the State Duma Sergei Ivanenko focused on the agenda of the future parliament. The politician divided all the contenders for Duma seats into four blocs: pro-Putin bureaucrats (United Russia), nationalists (LDPR, Glazyev-Rogozin bloc Rodina and the People's Party), communists and democratic parties (SPS and Yabloko). “The agenda has changed,” says the politician. “The question of guarantees of property rights and a review of the results of privatization has arisen.” On the issue of property, according to Ivanenko, each party expressed its position. United Russia believes that the oligarchs need to be subdued. Nationalists say that this is not enough and that all major oligarchs must be replaced, and preferably also imprisoned. The communists propose to abolish private property and return to socialism. Democrats argue that it is impossible to carry out a massive revision of property, but that the number of oligarchs needs to be increased from ten to 500 so that they do not influence life and there is competition.
According to the co-chair of the Union of Right Forces party, Irina Khakamada, in the future Duma, consolidation around the head of state will become weaker, because everyone will be preparing for the 2008 presidential elections and spending 70% of their time working outside parliament. “The consolidation of right-wing parties depends on the Kremlin. If United Russia carries out liberal reforms, the right will enter into a coalition with it; if not, the Duma alliance of the Union of Right Forces and Yabloko will strengthen,” Khakamada believes.
Deputy Chairman of the Yabloko party Sergei Mitrokhin shared with his colleagues his opinion that in the last Duma, thanks to the confrontation between Kremlin groups, it was possible to minimize the harm of bills prepared in the government and the presidential administration. Thus, Yabloko managed to prevent the creation of an administrative vertical in the country and restrain the dumping of a number of social obligations on regional budgets. Mitrokhin also listed the proposals that Yabloko is going to submit to the future Duma. First of all, this is a bill on the introduction of a unified social benefit, which would replace benefits for the poor, amendments limiting the role of monopolies, and a halving of the unified social tax. In addition, Yabloko is going to initiate a ban on the burial of foreign nuclear waste in Russia. Ksenia VERETENNIKOVA |
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