Translated material
IF PUTIN'S INITIATIVE FAILS, THIS WILL BE A SIGNAL!
SEPARATE CONVERSATION
For several years, Novaya Gazeta has been carrying out the action No Flashing Lights on the Roads! Since at least 2000, we have been calling on high officials, especially those seen in road accidents, to voluntarily surrender flashing beacons. In January 2000, our official requests for...
For several years, Novaya Gazeta has been carrying out the action No Flashing Lights on the Roads! Since at least 2000, we have been calling on high officials, especially those seen in road accidents, to voluntarily surrender flashing beacons.
In January 2000, our official requests in this regard were received by the then Minister of Labor S. Kalashnikov (in November 1998, an Audi crashed into an Opel of a resident of Lobnya on the Volokolamsk Highway in November 1998), the Minister of Taxes and Duties A. Pochinok (in August 1999 he rammed a Daewoo Nexia in the area of Trubnaya Square), as well as the Patriarch of All Russia Alexy II (in May 1999, his Mercedes with a flasher crashed into a Toyota on Prechistinskaya Square).
We personally delivered a letter to the patriarch with a proposal to refuse special signals to the gates of his residence in Chisty Lane in an old-style black editorial "Zaporozhets" equipped with flashing beacons. Under the guns of TV cameras, a policeman at the gate accepted the message and handed it over to the office. I still remember that we had not had time to drive away from the residence of his Holiness, as our "Zaporozhets" was immediately arrested and handed over to the police officer directly at the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. That is, we were the first arrested carriers of flashing beacons who felt the struggle of the state with privileges on the roads.
At that time, officials and businessmen for the most part did not respond to our requests to stop flashing lights. Few of them voluntarily removed special signals from their cars (these were several deputies of the Moscow City Duma, including our colleague Evgeny Bunimovich, and its chairman, Mr. Platonov, as well as banker Alexander Lebedev). The Minister for Taxes and Duties, Pochinok, replied that he would not give the flasher, he needed it himself.
In 2000, according to statistics collected by our correspondents, an average of 35 cars with flashing lights per hour moved along Tverskaya on weekdays. At the White House, the flow was 32 cars with special signals.
And yet, soon the initiative of the media (the action against travel privileges was carried out not only by Novaya Gazeta) was supported by two ministers of the interior. At first, Boris Gryzlov, and then Rashid Nurgaliyev, consistently made statements about the need to combat flashing lights and special numbers.
The first criminal cases broke out. A little over a year ago, there was a scandal with fake special numbers. Employees of the FSO accidentally discovered two "BMW", like two drops of water similar to each other. They had identical numbers of the EKX series - such are usually issued to cars belonging to the Federal Security Service. After checking, it turned out that one of the cars was registered to a figurehead.
The investigation established: some enterprising people put the cloning of machines on stream. Depending on the set of attributes (strobe lights, flashing lights, "chandeliers", license plates with the Russian flag, an order prohibiting inspection in a car), the car cost the customer from 40 to 200 thousand dollars. The dealers came up with a clever move: in order to protect the client, they selected the exact same car (make, color) for the customer for his car, which was already used by one of the civil servants.
Colonel Mikhail Shapatin, deputy head of the Main Center for Administrative, Economic and Transport Support of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Alexei Tarasov, a former employee of the Foreign Intelligence Service, Mikhail Motoriko, a former employee of the Moscow traffic police, and a dubious young man Alexei Yakovlev, who did not work anywhere but had free access to the Kremlin, are accused of fraud. Vyacheslav Sher is considered the main figure in this case - according to investigators, he is the organizer of a criminal business. Now the case is being heard in the Timiryazevsky District Court, however, the preliminary investigation was held in a closed mode from the press.
However, special attention to the problem of travel privileges was attracted not even by a criminal case, but by cases of death in road accidents of top Russian officials. And the fact that ordinary citizens are often blamed for incidents. After the death of the governor of the Altai Territory, Mikhail Evdokimov, whose Mercedes crashed into Oleg Shcherbinsky's Toyota at a speed of about 200 km per hour, Shcherbinsky was blamed for the tragedy, which caused great public outrage. Protests swept across the country, and Shcherbinsky was acquitted. When a positive outcome was obvious, United Russia activists joined the fight against themselves.
And in 2006, the initiative to get rid of flashing lights followed from the Russian president. At a meeting of security forces, V. Putin drew the attention of the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to this issue. As soon as this happened, United Russia collectively and publicly abandoned flashing lights.
The haste, obviously, is explained by the presence of competition - what if the Party of Life seizes the initiative in supporting the president's thoughts? At least, no one has previously prevented the bearish parliamentary majority from adopting an appropriate law on flashing lights, which has been gathering dust in the bowels of the Duma for a long time and even in three versions.
And rushed plots on the central TV channels. Funny, because they are very similar to those filmed with the participation of Novaya journalists 6 years ago.
True, one point remains unnoticed: flashing lights can be canceled, but escort jeeps (also with flashing lights) and the so-called “vehicle orders” that do not allow traffic inspectors to check the car of the owner of such a piece of paper remain (the market for such documents is estimated at tens of millions of dollars) . You can also rent a car directly from the motor transport plant of the Presidential Administration (for more details, Novaya Gazeta, No. 49 for last year) for only 510 rubles per hour with all numbers and special passes.
Our many years of experience in the fight against privileges on the road shows that if the market for flashing lights disappears, there will be many others that are similar (special passes, operational cover documents, special series numbers, etc.). The result of the current mass campaign will only be that prices in these markets will rise significantly.
Comments
Kirill KABANOV - Chairman of the National Anti-Corruption Committee:
- Now, depending on the proposed "package of documents", it is possible to install flashing beacons, the so-called "flashing lights", for 25-50 thousand dollars. With the reduction of the official owners of this privilege (from about 7.5 thousand people to 1.2 thousand), the price of flashing lights will increase to approximately 100-150 thousand dollars.
As for United Russia's public action to remove special signals, it should be taken into account that Boris Gryzlov belongs to the number of persons protected by the Federal Security Service, that is, an escort car with its flashing lights is also attached to him.
United Russia publicly removed flashing lights, including chairmen of Duma committees, but if you look at the bill on this score, which they support, it seems that the same chairmen of State Duma committees still have the right to flashing lights. Where is the logic here? And why have the bills of Pokhmelkin and Ryzhkov, which proposed more radical measures, been lying around in the Duma for so long?
There are also separate issues, for example, on prescriptions for vehicles, the so-called "special slips", which prevent the car from being checked. They now cost officials about the same $25,000-50,000 per document. Or special numbers (will flashers be canceled, and special numbers will be left, just changing them a little?).
Rostov-on-Don
According to the press secretary of the Governor of the Rostov region Vladimir Chub Evgeny Boevets, there are no flashing lights on the governor's car. When he moves around the city, he is not accompanied by traffic police cars with flashing lights. But when Chub travels to districts and other cities of the region, and also meets "distinguished guests", he is accompanied by one or more traffic police cars with special signals.
Omsk
Having heard a question about flashing lights, the press service of the governor of the Omsk region Polezhaev sent Alexander Burlachenko to his assistant. He, in turn, kicked back without any explanation. After the second attempt, the representative of the press service nevertheless said that they knew nothing about the intention to remove special signals from the governor's cars. On the contrary, according to their information, at the last meeting of President Putin with the heads of regions, the head of the traffic police of Russia, Viktor Kiryanov, spoke. He, according to a representative of the press service of the Omsk governor, called on regional leaders to take more care of their own safety on the roads in order to avoid a repetition of the tragedy with the head of the Altai Territory, Evdokimov.