The Duma introduces a mixed election system at the local level

Elections of representative bodies at the municipal level should be held using a mixed system: in single-member districts and according to party lists. This is what State Duma deputies decided on Friday, approving in the first reading a bill that actually establishes the same rules for local government as for state authorities. Opposition parties fear that this will make municipal authorities strictly dependent on the “executive vertical.”

The current law “On the general principles of organizing local self-government in the Russian Federation” allows all municipalities to independently decide how to elect deputies of representative bodies. True, Article 23 of the law stipulates that municipalities have the right to use only those electoral systems that are provided for by the law of the subject of the federation. But regional authorities, in turn, are limited by federal legislation, which provides for a majoritarian system, proportional and mixed.

The Duma members actually decided to transfer municipal elections to a mixed electoral system, conceptually approving the bill of the Right Russia deputies, introduced in the summer. If their amendments to the law “On the general principles of organizing local self-government in the Russian Federation” and to the law “On basic guarantees of electoral rights and the right to participate in a referendum of citizens of the Russian Federation” gain legal force before the end of this year, then on the next single voting day, March 1, 2009 This year, Russians will elect representative bodies of local self-government both in single-mandate districts and according to party lists. We are talking “specifically about party lists,” one of the authors of the bill, State Duma Vice-Speaker from A Just Russia, Alexander Babakov, explained to Kommersant, although the text of the draft contains another term - “lists of electoral associations.”

Which of the terms will be included in the final text of the law will become clear only after the second reading of the draft, scheduled for the end of November. But the semantic difference, as opposition parties fear, could be fatal for local government. The terms “party” and “electoral association” have become almost synonymous since 2002, when the law “On Political Parties” appeared, declaring them the only subject of the country’s political life. Since then, only parties have participated in elections at the federal and regional levels. As soon as any of them is officially included in the election campaign, it immediately becomes an “electoral association” according to election laws. Non-political social movements and associations, having lost the right to participate in federal and regional elections in 2002, retained it at the municipal level. But the amendment to the laws proposed by the Right Russians could cut their rights in half.

The Duma Committee on Constitutional Legislation initially (October 10, 2008) gave a negative opinion on this bill, but a few days later (October 15) it recommended approving the draft in the first reading. The head of the committee, Vladimir Pligin, explained the change in opinion to Kommersant by saying that initially the committee members believed that domestic parties had not yet developed enough to be widely represented at the municipal level, but after “a thorough discussion with all interested parties,” the committee decided that the concept the bill deserves approval. Now, according to him, another round of detailed discussion is ahead, so that by the second reading there will be complete clarity who will share half of the mandates of municipal deputies.

That is, everything “depends on one word,” as Boris Nadezhdin, head of the MIPT law department and secretary of the federal political council, told Kommersant. If the word “party” appears in the law instead of the words “electoral association,” then “everything could end for public associations,” and the importance of administrative resources in local elections will increase.

Viktor Kommersant-Khamraev

The parties will reach the districts