Dmitry Mishin. Faces of the President

Faces of the President
Dmitry Mishin

Publication date: February 13, 2004

On Thursday, almost 600 journalists from all over the country gathered in the capital to cover a grand event - a meeting of presidential candidate Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin with his proxies. Taking into account the latest events in Moscow and the participation of the head of state in the upcoming meeting, the press was first gathered in the press center of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Zubovsky Boulevard, where security officers spent three hours checking the accreditations and impressive luggage of television operators and various support services. We were immediately warned that “it’s better not to take piercing or cutting objects, as well as spray paint and food.” There was a possibility that, in addition to terrorists, members of the extremist National Bolshevik Party would try to “communicate” with the president.

At approximately twelve o'clock, the press representatives were put on buses and taken to Moscow State University, where, as it turned out, a meeting of the presidential candidate with proxies was scheduled. On the way, everyone was warned that since the upcoming event was not a press conference, there would be no questions for the president from journalists.

About 300 trustees gathered - two hundred less than four years ago. Among the identically dressed and combed officials, a thin, tall man, all in black and wearing a wide-brimmed hat, stood out noticeably; perhaps it was Mikhail Boyarsky. In the 2000 elections, presidential candidate Vladimir Putin chose almost the entire quota of proxies - according to the law there can be no more than 600. This year, the current president hopes to make do with fewer forces.

The president called his half-hour speech a report to voters. The performance consisted of two blocks. The first criticized the past, the second described the successes of recent years. The impoverishment of the country, default, huge foreign debt and the dominance of terrorist gangs characterized the situation in Russia. “...The country has fallen into a humiliating dependence on international financial organizations and various kinds of international financial speculators,” Putin noted . “Just think: in terms of GDP, Russia’s external debt at the end of 1999 was almost 90 percent.” A lot has changed since then. Strikes have disappeared in the country, pensions have increased by 90%, and citizens' incomes have increased by 1.5 times. GDP growth amounted to 30 percent, inflation decreased three times, the level of gold and foreign exchange reserves of the Central Bank allows the country to easily pay international obligations. Without directly linking the growth of the Russian economy with high global oil prices, the president nevertheless noted that the country’s economy remains largely “raw materials”, which in conditions of market instability is fraught with significant dangers.

In politics, over the past period, according to the president, “the vertical of power has been strengthened,” “constitutional order has been restored,” “political competition” has emerged, parliament has become a “professional body,” “dramatic changes have taken place in the justice system.”

Then, for more than an hour, the presidential candidate answered questions from his trusted representatives, among whom were quite famous people (as a journalist from the Rossiya TV channel put it, “ many trusted representatives recognize familiar faces in each other” ).

The head of Putin's campaign headquarters, Dmitry Kozak, tried in every possible way to show that the president does not know what questions his proxies will ask and that the answers are impromptu. Indeed, the questions were different. “Vladimir Vladimirovich!” Svetlana Khorkina asked loudly, “what should Russian gymnasts do to win the Olympics?” Putin, as it seemed to the Russian Journal correspondent, was confused by the question (doping scandals among Russian athletes do not subside), and the president answered laconically: “Win.”

“Vladimir Vladimirovich! You won’t have time to do what you set out to do! You need 7 years,” suggested one of the trusted representatives. The President responded by repeating the idea he had already voiced about the undesirability of any adjustments in this area. “ We want to achieve stability by undermining the basic law of the state - the Constitution,” he warned. “As soon as we start to rule the Constitution , this will already lead to an unstable situation. After all, once you start, then you won’t stop. Therefore, it is better not to touch the basic law of the state and work in the framework that those people who worked on this law laid down ."

The president said that if he is elected in March, he is ready to find and offer his successor to society in four years: “ If people agree and support, then this will be a continuation of what is being done now. But in this case, even if this person is worthy, experienced, he’s still a different person. With him comes fresh people, fresh ideas, fresh approaches to solving the problems that the country faces. This is always a plus .”

The candidate considers the collapse of the Soviet Union a national tragedy, but this can also find its advantages: “Russia must stop being a cash cow for everyone.” The foreign policy views of the Russian President are well known, but he clearly formulated the national idea almost for the first time: “ We need to be competitive in everything. A person must be competitive. City, village, industry and the whole country.” Yielding to the persuasion of his trusted persons, the candidate for President of the Russian Federation extended the meeting for half an hour, after which he left to serve as acting President of the Russian Federation.

Other candidates (I. Khakamada, N. Kharitonov) have already expressed dissatisfaction with the fact that the meeting of one of the candidates with proxies was shown live on the Rossiya TV channel for almost half an hour. “There are elements of overkill in the coverage of this event by some state media,” Alexander Veshnyakov also noted.

Indeed, the organizers emphasized in every possible way that this was a meeting of a presidential candidate, and not at all of the current head of state. Putin was accompanied only by the head of the election headquarters, Dmitry Kozak, while the presidential press secretary and the head of protocol were absent. In her appeal, Irina Khakamada asks that she also be given time on live television to meet with her trusted representatives.