Only United Russia is ready for money

The richest party is still United Russia. And so rich that she is the only one who is already financially ready for the Duma elections. The poorest were the Patriots of Russia. In “Right Cause,” on the contrary, the period of poverty ended. Russian parties completed the second quarter with such financial achievements, the reports of which were published by the Central Election Commission on its website.

The second quarter is the last, following which parties must submit financial reports to the CEC. The end of the next quarter will coincide in time with the Duma campaign, the start of which is expected to be announced in the last days of August. Therefore, next time the parties will have to send to the Central Election Commission reports on the income and expenses of election funds, which each of them is obliged to create. The law allows party members to use money from their own party coffers in elections. But, judging by the information from the Central Election Commission, the parties have not yet begun to intensively accumulate money for the elections.

None of the seven parties in the country now replenishes the federal treasury with membership fees. Even the communists, who stubbornly preserve Soviet traditions, do not take a penny to the center: all contributions from party members remain at the disposal of regional branches. The general party fund is made up of donations. Moreover, only among the supporters of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation and Yabloko were there enthusiasts who were willing and able to support these parties with rubles. Communist enthusiasts gave 1.13 million rubles to their party, Yabloko members - 18 thousand.

The main source of filling almost all party coffers remains donations from legal entities. Any domestic company, if it is not a state-owned company, has the right to donate no more than 43.3 million rubles to any party during the year. The Patriots of Russia found themselves in the most dire situation last spring, for the entire quarter they found no donors either among citizens or among companies. Those 7.17 million rubles that appear in their report in the column “other receipts not prohibited by law,” the “patriots” were forced to transfer almost entirely (6.1 million rubles) to their regional branches, including for participation in regional elections.

Actually, because of the March regional elections, all parties, especially parliamentary ones, lost money: after all, that campaign became for them a rehearsal for the future Duma elections. In particular, the LDPR, which collected more than 40 million rubles during the quarter. donations, spent 26.6 million rubles of them. for "propaganda activities". Spent 43.3 million rubles for the same purposes. "A Just Russia" from the 66 million rubles it received from sponsors. Another 20 million rubles. Spravorossy spent on holding congresses and party conferences, which in the past quarter turned out to be fateful for them. Let us recall that the April congress of A Just Russia ended with a change in the chairman of the party - instead of Sergei Mironov, who retained the title of informal leader, the party was headed by the ex-leader of the Just Russia faction in the State Duma, Nikolai Levichev. In the spring, the Communists transferred more than 106 million rubles to the regions. out of 109 million rubles. donations received.

But the Right Cause party, which at the beginning of the year was the poorest and collected only 3 million rubles in the first quarter, got rid of the lack of money. In the second quarter, the Pravodelites were able to raise 24.3 million rubles. donations. However, 21.4 million rubles. they spent on “holding congresses and party conferences.” True, thanks to this, the party found a new leader - billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov. He is more concerned not with the problems of filling the party coffers, but with legislative restrictions in finance, due to which “Right Cause” is deprived of the opportunity, as Mr. Prokhorov said in an interview with Kommersant on July 5, “to defeat United Russia with one payment.”

Only the Yabloko party had savings, which on March 1 had 14.2 million rubles in its cash register, and by July 1 there were almost 26 million rubles. By cutting current expenses to a minimum, Yabloko is apparently trying to save money for the elections.

The richest party remains United Russia, which allowed itself to attract 211.7 million rubles in the second quarter. and at the same time transfer 245.1 million rubles to regional and other structures. Having started the quarter with almost a billion (989.8 million rubles), United Russia ended it with 838.3 million rubles.

Thus, United Russia remains the party most prepared for the elections. It is worth noting that most of the donations for which United Russia reports to the Central Election Commission come to the party's account from the United Russia party support fund. Until now, United Russia has never publicly disclosed how much the fund has. It is only known that this foundation became the official founder of the All-Russian Popular Front. In addition, according to the law “On Elections of State Duma Deputies,” the election fund of any party can contain a maximum of 700 million rubles. Each party has the right to transfer half of this amount (350 million rubles) to its election fund from its party treasury. The remaining funds can be raised through donations. An ordinary Russian has the right to help his party before the elections with no more than 490 thousand rubles, a domestic non-state company - with no more than 24.5 million rubles. Judging by the experience of recent Russian history, sponsors with such solvency may be interested before elections in either the party in power itself or the party that the authorities recommend to them.

Victor Khamraev

Party cash desks are approaching the elections