Translated material
Tea, not Barinov
The President found a replacement for the disgraced Nenets governor
On June 2, Russian President Vladimir Putin, by decree, temporarily suspended Alexey Barinov from the post of head of the administration of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug in connection with the representation of the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation and the initiation of a criminal case against the Nenets governor. By the same presidential decree, the chief federal inspector for this region, Valery Potapenko, a former KGB officer of Tajikistan, was appointed acting governor of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug.Let us remind you that Mr. Barinov is now under arrest in the Arkhangelsk pre-trial detention center. On May 19, the Prosecutor General's Office charged him with large-scale fraud and theft, and on May 24 he was arrested by court order. The Nenets governor has been charged under two articles of the Criminal Code - 159 (large-scale fraud committed by a group of persons) and 160 (theft of property). The episodes incriminated against him date back to 1999, when Mr. Barinov worked as the general director of Arkhangelskgeoldobycha OJSC.
The President of Russia does not know the new acting governor from Tajikistan. In the 90s, Mr. Potapenko worked with Vladimir Putin at the St. Petersburg FSB Directorate. Mr. Potapenko has held the position of federal inspector for the Nenets Autonomous Okrug since August 2004, and before him this position was held by Alexey Barinov. Vremya Novostey's sources in the administration of the Autonomous Okrug claim that “during their joint work, normal working relations have developed between the current acting head of the administration of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug and Alexei Barinov.”
It is planned that today the presidential plenipotentiary in the Northwestern District Ilya Klebanov will introduce the new governor to the district administration. Apparently, Mr. Potapenko will receive a fairly warm welcome in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug. The political elite of the district almost unanimously declared that the presidential choice had fallen on the right person. Not only representatives of United Russia and opponents of Mr. Barinov agree with this, but also his supporters. The head of the information department of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug Administration, Viktor Turovsky, says that Mr. Potapenko “worked constructively with the governor, while in other regions inspectors often conflict with the heads.” The official believes that the interim will not carry out any purges or radical changes in the administration.
Speaker of the Nenets Parliament Igor Koshin considers the decision of the Russian President to temporarily resign the head of the administration of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug Alexei Barinov as “justified and normal.” In his opinion, Mr. Potapenko is “exactly the person who is able to maintain stability in the district and organize the normal work of the administration.” The head of the representative office of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug administration in the Arkhangelsk region, Dmitry Nesanelis, considers the replacement to be “the most logical.”
Meanwhile, the fate of the temporarily retired Nenets governor Alexei Barinov is very difficult. On the day when Vladimir Putin sent him into temporary retirement, the Arkhangelsk Regional Court was considering the cassation appeal of the governor’s lawyer about changing the preventive measure. As expected, the court did not satisfy the complaint of Mr. Barinov’s lawyers, and he remained in custody.
After the court hearing, the ex-governor’s lawyer, Vsevolod Yesakov, said that he considers the refusal of the Arkhangelsk regional court “unfounded and intends to appeal it to a higher authority.” The lawyer considers the prosecution's arguments unproven and plans to prepare complaints to a higher authority. Mr. Barinov, in turn, stated that he completely agreed with his defense lawyer, and noted that he did not plead guilty, and therefore was not going to hide from the investigation.
Now the temporarily retired governor will remain in the Arkhangelsk pre-trial detention center until the court hearing or until a higher court changes this decision.