Translated material
Representative of Evenkia in the Kremlin
An apologist for the election of members of the Federation Council comes to the presidential administration
Yuri Sharandin, who previously held the position of head of the Federation Council Committee on Constitutional Legislation, was appointed deputy head of the presidential administration department for domestic policy (and we are clearly talking about the administration of Dmitry Medvedev). Information about this appointment was confirmed yesterday by a source in the presidential administration.In the upper house of parliament, Yuri Sharandin represented the Evenki Autonomous Okrug, abolished due to unification with the Krasnoyarsk Territory. The post of deputy head of the internal policy department of the Kremlin administration was previously held by Leonid Ivlev, who was appointed a member of the Central Election Commission at the end of last year. Mr. Ivlev oversaw the relationship between the presidential administration and the State Duma, the Federation Council and political parties.
Like Mr. Ivlev, Yuri Sharandin is a member of United Russia , although he has not been particularly active on the party line. He is a lawyer by training, a candidate of sciences, and graduated from Moscow State University named after M.V. Lomonosov, Moscow Higher Party School, postgraduate studies at the Russian Academy of Civil Service. He worked in a variety of structures, from the Moscow City Komsomol Committee to the Moscow City Duma, where he was elected in 1997. In 2001, he was one of the leaders of the election headquarters of Boris Zolotarev, who won the election for governor of Evenkia. Soon after this, Yuri Sharandin went to represent the region in the Federation Council.
As head of the Committee on Constitutional Legislation, Mr. Sharandin became known as an ardent supporter of the idea of restoring the election of senators. A month ago, he, together with Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov, told reporters that there is a way to do this without changing the Constitution. The Basic Law assumes that the upper house is formed from above and includes two representatives from each region - from the legislative assembly and from the local administration. There is no provision for election of representatives. However, as Yuri Sharandin stated, if instead of the word “election” the legal formulation “voting on persons proposed by the authorities” is used in relation to the plebiscite, the letter of the law will be observed. And senators, on the one hand, will remain representatives selected by the authorities, on the other hand, they will receive a mandate of trust from citizens.
At first, this project was perceived in the expert community as another joke on the topic of the literal perception of constitutional norms - after popular discussions about the “third term” bypassing the law. However, in light of the fact that one of the authors of this idea will oversee the relations between the presidential administration and parliament, it no longer seems so hopelessly utopian.
Meanwhile, in addition to Evenkia, Taimyr also joined the Krasnoyarsk Territory. The representative of this region also still works in the committee on constitutional legislation, although the autonomous region that sent him has long been absent from the map of the country. Obviously, his removal from the post of senator and transfer to another job is also not far off.