| The election of the governor of the Volgograd region is developing in the genre of a political farce The other day, the Volgograd Regional Election Commission announced the names of 13 registered candidates for the post of head of the administration of the Volgograd region, whose elections are scheduled to take place on December 5. Due to the large number of candidates and the string of scandals accompanying the current election campaign, residents of the region openly call what is happening nothing more than a “circus” or a “booth.”
At the same time, not only local political scientists, but also ordinary Volgograd residents are well aware that there are, at best, only four real contenders for the position of head of the region. These are the current communist governor Nikolai Maksyuta, State Duma deputy Oleg Savchenko, the current mayor of the regional center Evgeny Ishchenko, as well as the head of the State Duma Committee on Sports and Tourism, head of the Volgograd branch of United Russia, honorary president of the Rotor Premier League football club Vladimir Goryunov.
The remaining candidates were nominated either out of excessive conceit or as part of an insidious PR plan in order to “dilute” the candidates for his seat who were less authoritative than the current governor.
Long before the registration of all candidates in the regional election commission, numerous complaints from candidates began to be received about the actions of competing headquarters. There have already been about twenty such complaints. Several candidates, taking into account that these gubernatorial elections may be the last (the Duma should adopt a law abolishing direct gubernatorial elections on October 29), spared no expense, recruited the best specialists in the field of PR technologies from Moscow and completely trusted them. Obviously, thanks to this, on the last day of submitting election documents, Volgograd residents witnessed an obscene altercation between the vice-mayor of Volgograd, Yuri Zhelonkin, and the twice-convicted gubernatorial candidate Alexander Galda.
A scandal also erupted around the mayor of the city himself, candidate for governor Yevgeny Ishchenko. The other day, the prosecutor's office of the Volgograd region filed an application with the regional arbitration court to recognize the illegal purchase by the Volgograd administration of a Mercedes-Benz official car for Evgeniy Ishchenko, which he previously owned. During the inspection, it was found that the city administration, when purchasing a foreign car, violated the decree of the President of Russia “On priority measures to prevent corruption and reduce budget expenditures when organizing the purchase of products for state needs,” as well as the provisions of the laws of the Russian Federation and the Volgograd region that determine the order of supplies and procurement of products for government needs. In particular, the mayor's personal Mercedes was purchased with budget funds as a company car without announcing an open competition. It is noteworthy that, according to documents, Evgeny Ishchenko bought this foreign car, produced in 1995, in 2000 for 83 thousand rubles. at your relative's. The administration of Volgograd paid 704,500 rubles for this car.
The nomination of the honorary president of the Rotor football club, Vladimir Goryunov, to the post of governor was not without scandal. According to official Volgograd media, Rotor players said they refuse to go to training until the club’s management pays them a seven-month salary arrears. However, Vladimir Goryunov states that information about the crisis in the team is gossip spread by his rival in the election race for the post of head of the Volgograd region, Evgeniy Ishchenko and his team. Despite the “intrigues” of Ishchenko’s team, “Rotor” still continues to play in the Premier League and take part in matches. But most likely he will leave this season, and the club really hasn’t paid his salary for several months.
It is possible that closer to the election date, Volgograd residents will again be reminded of the criminal economic acts that took place at enterprises controlled by gubernatorial candidate Oleg Savchenko. In the spring of this year, the regional prosecutor's office has already opened a criminal case against the former acting. General Director of Khimprom OJSC Evgeny Kisil under Article 201 Part 2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation - “abuse of power that caused harm to a commercial organization.” It is suspected that the total damage caused to Khimprom by the board of the interim management team was estimated at 600 million rubles. Well, competitors cannot forgive the current governor Nikolai Maksyuta for his close connection with LUKOIL, a monopolist in the production and trade of oil and petroleum products in the region. Dmitry KUTEPOV, Volgograd |
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