Translated material
Eat the winners
Mikhail Kasyanov was not allowed to lead the Democratic Party
Taking away the brand of a political party in these days of raging political technologies is not a difficult thing. The main thing is the availability of administrative resources and money. A clear example of how this is done is the story that happened to the Democratic Party of Russia (DPR) last Saturday.Political strategists became interested in one of the oldest parties in modern Russia solely because ex-Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov was going to lead it. An unprecedented intrigue unfolded around the 19th Extraordinary Congress of the Democratic Party, which was to be held on December 17 in the October Hall of the House of Unions. The head of the Central Committee of the Democratic Party, Andrei Bogdanov, and his comrades decided to prevent Mr. Kasyanov from becoming the leader of the DPR, and the party from remaining homogeneous.
That’s why Saturday’s gray Moscow morning turned out to be “cheerful.” That night, Mr. Kasyanov’s opponents posted security at the House of Unions. And Mr. Bogdanov included in the lists for passage only those delegates who supported him. The head of the DPR organizing committee, Alexander Polovinkin, was never able to enter the hall, although no one canceled his powers. The same thing happened with numerous delegates from Kursk, Volgograd, Kaliningrad, Kalmykia... As a result, Mikhail Kasyanov, Irina Khakamada (at the congress she was preparing to announce the accession of the Our Choice movement to the Democratic Party of Russia), as well as the heads of regional branches decided to postpone events at the Izmailovo cinema and concert hall. Of the 243 delegates, 149 people moved there. However, the leaders of the Democratic Party of Russia did not hold the congress, since they did not reach a quorum for the number of regional branches. Representatives of 32 branches came to Izmailovo; 45 were needed for a quorum. They decided to hold a conference or meeting to determine what to do next.
Actually, it is difficult for the representatives of the Democratic Party of Russia who gathered in Izmailovo, despite all their emotionality, to refuse to soberly assess the situation. The outcome of the congress, initiated by Mr. Bogdanov, was predetermined in advance due to its wide financial capabilities and administrative resources. The brand will be selected, and Bogdanov’s documents will, without a doubt, be registered by the Ministry of Justice. Even despite the fact that the majority of DPR members will remain with the founding father of the party, Nikolai Travkin, Mikhail Kasyanov and Irina Khakamada. And by the way, this is not a split in the party, which the journalists of the party leaders so actively asked about on the day of the events. It’s just that the Democratic Party left the Democratic Party, leaving Mr. Bogdanov with three letters.
But real representatives of the DPR face a difficult task. Give up the fight for the brand, don’t waste time and energy arguing with Bogdanov’s people, but try to register a new organization. Fortunately for the DPR, the majority understands this, as was stated at the conference in Izmailovo. But still, it is difficult for experienced party members to abandon the brand of one of the oldest democratic parties. And they called for its re-creation.
The leaders were inclined to the first option. Ms. Khakamada said that it was useless to sue Bogdanov’s organization. Representative of the Kalmyk branch of the DPR Nikolai Askirov is also confident: “We will be dragged through the courts. In the field of power, we will always be beaten. Therefore, we need to start from scratch.” Many speakers called it a plus that the authorities “played” the DPR at the initial stage. It would be worse to discover the “disease” right before the elections. In other words, political strategists were somewhat hasty in “killing” the political career of ex-Prime Minister Kasyanov.
Together with Ms. Khakamada, Mikhail Kasyanov diagnosed the current government as “fear of freedom.” The leader of Our Choice said that the government’s aggressiveness towards the democratic opposition is not new to her, but the scale came as a surprise. “The authorities understand that if the Kasyanov project takes place, it will be a re-creation of politics in Russia,” Ms. Khakamada emphasized.
Having stated that this time the authorities had won, Mr. Kasyanov turned to his colleagues in the future party: “Nothing terrible happened. On the contrary, this is just the beginning. The authorities are afraid, afraid of freedom. Your activity." He recalled that the parliamentary elections are two years away. As a result of the discussion, the ex-prime minister proposed to calculate in a week all aspects (political, legal, etc.) of both the creation of a new party and the re-creation of the Democratic Party of Russia. After that, proposals on the topic “How to live further” will be sent to regional offices. So the fate of the DPR will finally be decided after Christmas.
Real leaders of other democratic movements also came to Izmailovo to join the real Democratic Party. In particular, the leader of the Union of Rightist Forces Nikita Belykh. He called for unity in the elections and a moratorium on critical statements by Democrats about each other.