Translated material
Vanishing power
No one controls the capital of Karachay-Cherkessia
Preparations for the March 11 elections in the Caucasus fully reflect the diversity of local color. In Dagestan, the election chronicle has already been enriched with disappearances and assassination attempts , which indicate that this republic, after all the improvements in the electoral system, has not moved so far from the hot 90s of the last century. A no less acute situation has developed in Karachay-Cherkessia. The confrontation between two “influence groups” led there to the disruption of the elections of the city assembly of the regional capital - Cherkessk.Elections canceled
This week, the Republican Election Commission officially invited the prosecutor's office of Karachay-Cherkessia to recognize the upcoming elections as disrupted. At the same time, the Republican Electoral Commission appealed to the Supreme Court of the republic with a request to set a new date for the elections and determine the body that will be responsible for holding them.
Formally, the deadline for the elections of the Circassian Duma is December of this year, but local political practice shows that such a framework is not mandatory. This means that the current unprecedented situation, when there is not a single legitimate authority in the capital of the Russian region, may drag on indefinitely. Meanwhile, anyone who was in Cherkessk could see firsthand the deplorable state of the city, which was left without legitimate leadership.
The current composition of the City Duma was actually dissolved by the decision of the Supreme Court of the Republic on February 20 of this year. The head of the Cherkessk municipality, Evgeniy Belanov, who was elected by city deputies from among himself, was automatically deprived of his powers. The powers of Mayor Pyotr Korotchenko were also challenged by the court. At the same time, Mr. Korotchenko is the only city leader who de facto performs his duties.
The elections of a new City Duma on March 11 would have helped to get out of this situation, but they were thwarted by the city authorities, who committed more than a dozen violations of varying degrees of severity during their preparation. The most serious are the interference in the composition of the municipal electoral commission, which has now practically ceased to exist, and the absence of a new map of electoral districts. Five of the 11 members of the city election commission left for various reasons with the consent of the current city Duma, two decided to run for the new Duma themselves. The appointment of three members, with whom the city meeting tried to reinforce the remaining ones, was again challenged by the Supreme Court, since deputies cannot form the electoral commission themselves. The need to carve out new electoral districts has arisen due to the fact that, according to the new norms of federal legislation on municipal self-government, the Circassian Duma should have not 20, but 25 deputies. The head of the Republican Election Commission, Safar Geryukov, has been warning since November last year about the need to form new districts, but this work has never been completed.
It would theoretically be possible to hold elections in Cherkessk through the efforts of the republican commission. But they must be appointed by the City Duma, and it was actually dissolved by the Supreme Court. The court remained the only republican authority that could break the deadlock in Circassian democracy. But the judicial system in Karachay-Cherkessia is opposed to the administration of the president of the republic. This confrontation led to the current unpleasant precedent.
Mayor to be removed
It all started back in 2003, when the Chairman of the Supreme Court of the Karachay-Cherkess Republic Islam Burlakov lost the presidential election to the current head of the republic, Mustafa Batdyev . The judge's result was third, but after the elections he teamed up with offended supporters of former President Vladimir Semenov. Since Mr. Semyonov shows no interest in political life in Karachay-Cherkessia, opposition to Mr. Batdyev clusters around the non-public but influential figure of a judge.
In 2003, the then mayor of Cherkessk, Mikhail Yakush , and his deputy, Pyotr Korotchenko, both ethnic Russians, supported the candidacy of Islam Burlakov in the presidential election, with Mr. Korotchenko even running alongside him as a potential vice president. Thus, after the victory of Mustafa Batdyev, the capital of the republic remained in the hands of his political competitors. This situation did not suit the presidential team. But in the fall of 2004, in connection with the political crisis that erupted due to the murder of seven Karachais at the dacha of the son-in-law of the new president of the republic, Aliya Kaitov, the parliament of the Karachay-Cherkess Republic extended the powers of all elected politicians of the republic, including the capital's mayor, for a year. Elections for a new mayor were scheduled for September 2005.
Meanwhile, Mikhail Yakush , who was greatly harmed by his alliance with Islam Burlakov in terms of political connections, expressed his loyalty to President Batdyev. And he agreed to dismiss his first deputy, Mr. Korotchenko, who, as is customary, was responsible for construction and finance. The deputy did not want to leave, turned to the chief judge for support and ended up winning. In August 2005, the court ruled to remove Mikhail Yakush from office due to the fact that the law extending his mayoral powers was adopted by republican deputies two days after the deadline for calling the next mayoral elections in Cherkessk expired. That is, it was used “retroactively.” The acting mayor was “Burlakov’s man” Pyotr Korotchenko, whose dismissal was declared illegal. A short phase of dual power followed, during which two mayors remained in the city hall. Elections scheduled for September 2005 were cancelled.
On December 31, 2005, the municipal election commission of Cherkessk, generally loyal to President Batdyev, decided to hold mayoral elections on March 12, 2006. But since January 2006, Federal Law No. 131 on a new system for the formation of municipal authorities came into force, which brought many problems to Karachay-Cherkessia and the North Caucasus as a whole. The law introduced a specific interpretation of the separation of powers, according to which one person does not have the right to be the head of a municipal entity and simultaneously lead its representative and executive bodies, that is, the meeting of deputies and the mayor’s office. In January 2006, the Circassian City Council, which now became known as the Duma, adopted the corresponding city charter. The head of the municipality was now elected by deputies from among themselves, and the mayor was hired under a contract by a commission consisting of the head of the city, several deputies and a representative of the president of the republic. These rules were supposed to come into effect for the new convocation of the Duma, but the deputies extended them to themselves. Khadzhi-Daut Tambiev became the head of the city and the Duma, and Pyotr Korotchenko became the mayor. The planned citywide mayoral election on March 12, 2006 did not take place because the court decided that it conflicted with the new charter. The city remained under opposition control.
However, by mid-2006, relations between Pyotr Korotchenko and first vice-mayor Pakhat Bayramukov, also a man from Islam Burlakov’s team, had deteriorated. This time, Mr. Korotchenko began to seek protection from the President of the Republic and found it, securing a loyal majority in the City Duma. Then the court remembered that Mr. Korotchenko became mayor, although according to the new charter, but with a violation: there was no representative of the president on the commission that hired him. The head of Cherkessk, Khadzhi-Daut Tambiev, dismissed Mr. Korotchenko from mayorship and appointed Pakhat Bayramukov as mayor, simultaneously proving in court that Korotchenko was appointed illegally. Two mayors have appeared at the mayor's office again.
To resolve this unfortunate misunderstanding, the presidential administration in mid-November 2006 convened the City Duma for an emergency meeting, held in the middle of the night in the Republican White House. Ten deputies loyal to Mr. Korotchenko and Mr. Batdyev attended the meeting. Khadzhi-Daut Tambiev and four other deputies did not participate in the meeting, but this did not prevent those gathered from depriving Mr. Tambiev of his powers as the head of the Cherkessk municipality. The former first deputy mayor, Mahar Ebzeev, became the acting mayor, and Petr Korotchenko became his deputy. As a sign of protest, five deputies led by Khadzhi Tambiev resigned early, and the court declared his removal from the post of head of the municipality illegal and prohibited the City Duma from doing anything due to the obvious lack of quorum.
With a list of 20 seats in the City Duma of Cherkessk, with the departure of Mr. Tambiev’s supporters, exactly half of the deputies remained. There were no 20 deputies in the assembly from the very beginning: in the December 2001 city council elections there was such a low turnout that only five were elected. Two months later, with difficulty, 13 more were elected, but then one died, one went to the republican parliament, and one resigned. The legal quorum is two-thirds. 15 deputies could still provide it. ten - no more.
The further history of Circassian municipal democracy repeated its turn of a year ago. Despite the injunction, the long-suffering City Duma met on December 30, 2006, consisting of 11 people: someone decided that 50% plus one vote was enough to make a legal decision. Therefore, deputy Khapali Bytdaev, a supporter of the president of the republic, who a few months before the start of the crisis officially and in full compliance with the regulations, resigned his powers, was returned to the City Duma. A graphological examination in December unexpectedly proved that it was not he who wrote the resignation letter. On the eve of the New Year, 11 deputies decided to elect a new head of the city and appoint a new mayor on January 30. Evgeniy Belanov became the head of the municipality, and Pyotr Korotchenko became the mayor. This time, a representative of the president of the republic was present during the appointment of the mayor, although the republican parliament forgot to confirm his powers.
Democracy can't be stopped
Naturally, the court protested these results: on February 20, a court decision was made on the illegitimacy of the “half-hearted” City Duma. It is apparently impossible to elect a new one on March 11, since in the heat of political passions in the city they even forgot to draw electoral districts. Local experts do not rule out that the current 11 deputies, loyal to the de facto mayor Pyotr Korotchenko and President Mustafa Batdyev, could deliberately disrupt the elections in order to retain their seats for a few more months. In this, they could theoretically be supported by the president’s team, which, after the severe image and material losses associated with the Aliya Kaitov case, simply does not have the resources to fight for seats in the city parliament.
In addition to Cherkessk, there is another municipality in the republic where the leadership of the presidential appointee has been disputed by the opposition for a year now. The head of the Karachaevsky district, Eldar Salpagarov, from the point of view of his opponents, holds his post not so much thanks to elections, the results of which are questionable, but thanks to family ties: he is married to the daughter of Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic Boris Gochiyaev, who in turn is the brother of the wife of the head of the presidential administration Murat Karaketov . The mayor of Karachaevsk, Sapar Laypanov, also a member of the presidential team, is married to the aunt of the former presidential son-in-law Aliya Kaitov, who was sentenced last December to 17 years in prison. Sapar Laypanov's powers, apparently, do not give rise to any complaints. But reports appeared in the local press that one of his close relatives helped the militants killed during a special operation by the federals in Cherkessk on the day the verdict was announced. One of the militants, Ramazan Tokov, according to law enforcement agencies, was subordinate to the semi-legendary emir of the Karachay jamaat, the alleged “author” of house bombings in Moscow, Achimez Gochiyaev, and he was killed in an apartment that belonged to one of the accused in the Kaitov case, Tamerlan Bostanov. Some local experts believe that the whole story of Tokov’s liquidation could have been staged in order to discredit President Batdyev. True, after the unrest in Cherkessk in the fall of 2004, they tried to convict the oppositionists of having connections with the Wahhabi underground.
Officially, Mustafa Batdyev's presidential powers expire in September 2008. Apparently, the presidential envoy to the Southern District, Dmitry Kozak, sympathizes with him. An economist by training and former profession, Mr. Batdyev is trying to cope with negative trends in the development of a depressed republic and maintain effective contacts with all the ethnic communities inhabiting it. At the same time, it is very difficult for his team to cope with the image consequences of the “Kaitov case” and at the same time resist the “judicial” opposition. But the “judicial ones”, it seems, do not have enough strength to capture the “dominant heights” in this mountainous republic.
According to one version, the court may try to avoid calling elections and achieve the appointment of Mikhail Yakush as mayor, who is again considered a member of Islam Burlakov’s team. This will absolutely not suit the presidential administration, so the triumph of municipal democracy in Cherkessk is ultimately inevitable.