as of November 14, 2004

Yesterday at a meeting of the Blagoveshchensk Duma, the issue of calling elections for the mayor of the city was considered. Deputies unanimously voted to set the date for the election of the mayor of the regional center to November 14. However, the setting of the date was preceded by a six-month epic determining when and how to vote for the new mayor. The day before the elections were called, the electoral code came into force, which provides for a two-round vote for the head of the municipality. For the first time, the issue of combining mayoral elections with presidential ones and reducing his powers was submitted to the people's representatives for consideration by the mayor of Blagoveshchensk, Alexander Kolyadin, in December 2003. At a meeting of the City Duma, the mayor of Blagoveshchensk lost the election question, which he himself raised. Then opponents of the current government jointly declared themselves - three opposition deputies (Kirill Zimin, Vyacheslav Sikorsky and Eduard Khasanshin), as well as Andrei Vedev and Lyubov Pashina did not appear at the meeting, and in the absence of a quorum it did not take place. According to the charter, the city parliament must have 15 deputies (only 13 were elected), and the Duma can work when there are at least 10 parliamentarians in the hall. After a failed attempt to gain a second term in power together with the president, Alexander Kolyadin accused individual deputies of cowardice and advised the townspeople to conclude “what kind of people are striving for power.” In turn, the oppositionists said that if the mayoral elections were combined with the presidential elections, Mr. Kolyadin’s rivals would find themselves in worse conditions and would not have time to properly conduct their election campaign.
In the spring of 2004, large-scale advertising began for a number of companies whose leaders are considered as candidates for the mayor's seat. Since that time, Mr. Kolyadin’s opponents began to sharply criticize the cooperation of the mayor’s office with Amur Utility Systems OJSC (AKS). And by the end of the summer, Governor Leonid Korotkov (who is in “cool” relations with the authorities of the regional center) managed to convince the regional council of people’s deputies to make changes to the regional electoral code.
Mr. Korotkov insisted that the winner of municipal elections should not be the candidate who received a simple majority, but the one who received more than half of the votes, otherwise a second round of elections would be scheduled, in which the two leaders of the first round would participate. If on June 24, 3 votes were not enough to pass the bill and the governor had to use his veto, then on August 19, 23 out of 28 deputies supported the governor’s amendments. The law came into force on August 30, the day before the date for the city Duma elections was set.
Yesterday, the issue of calling elections was first on the City Duma's agenda. All deputies (13) were present at the meeting and, without any debate, they voted for the date of voting for the election of the mayor of Blagoveshchensk - November 14.
The current mayor Alexander Kolyadin, the owner of the Allegro furniture company Irina Bashurova and the deputy governor Alexander Migulya have already announced their participation in them. Other potential contenders include the head of the Amurstroy company, Alexander Sinkov (close to the head of the Amur regional organization of Kyokushinkai-kan karate, Anatoly Fesenko) and two doctors - the head of the medical corporation “Human Health” Vyacheslav Dovgopoly and a private chiropractor Evgeniy Pushkarev, who is a deputy of the Blagoveshchensk City Duma . The nomination of City Duma Chairman Nikolai Volkov is also likely. It seems that the chief federal inspector for the Amur region, Valery Voshchevoz, will rely on him. The regional governor, apparently, will support his deputy Alexander Migulya. However, analysts do not exclude the possibility of including two more “Korotkovsky” candidates in the election race - Deputy Governor Valery Gladilov and Deputy Chairman of the Regional Council Oleg Turkov. In Blagoveshchensk they are talking about the possible nomination of the first secretary of the city committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Novikov. But in a conversation with a Kommersant correspondent, Mr. Novikov explained that the Blagoveshchensk communists will decide on a candidate only after the conference scheduled for September 4. The procedure for nominating candidates for mayor of Blagoveshchensk will begin on September 2.
PAVEL KOSHELENKO, Blagoveshchensk

Kommersant (Khabarovsk) No. 161 dated 01.09.2004

The Duma called mayoral elections