Municipal battles

Opposition and independent deputies do not let United Russia members into the chairs of the municipal assembly, create an alternative local parliament, and also demand the expansion of the powers of municipal bodies in Moscow

In almost two dozen Moscow municipalities — in those areas where the opposition, following the results of the March 4 local self-government elections, won the same number of seats as United Russia, or at least a little more than a third of the seats — a political crisis erupted. Opposition and independent deputies, having received in the elections in Moscow a total of about a third of the 1,500 seats in municipalities, are blocking candidates for chairmen of municipal assemblies that are pleasing to the heads of the council and United Russia. Indeed, according to the law, two-thirds of the votes are required to elect the head of the assembly.

Mikhail Velmakin, an experienced municipal deputy, observes the unfolding war for the post of chairman for the first time. “Nothing like this has happened in the last ten years. The procedure was of a formal nature, the chairman was elected in ten minutes, moreover, by open voting, and not closed, as determined by the regulations. Today, for the first time in many districts, they are trying to really elect a chairman, and not appoint one. Self-nominated deputies and representatives of the opposition, having agreed among themselves, are doing everything not to let United Russia members into the chairs. By law, the chairman must be elected at the first meeting. But now there are precedents when the meetings are held, and the chairmen are not elected,” said the people’s choice of the Otradnoye district. According to the deputy, the competent functioning of the municipal assembly depends largely on the chairman.

“The chairman is a monetary position,” the deputy continues. - This is such a kind of coordinator of municipal deputies, who usually sits at his post for several terms, lives in a neighboring house and works a couple of hours a day. At the same time, his salary is 100 thousand rubles. It should be noted that the head of the council is interested in having good relations with the chairman.”

Mikhail Velmakin is one of the founders of the Council of Deputies of the Municipal Assembly. The public movement plans to gather under its roof to coordinate actions and exchange experiences of opposition and independent deputies of the city. The main goal of the project is the development of legal acts aimed at the gradual transfer of powers from district administrations to municipal authorities. There is a federal law on local self-government, and there is a law that concerns cities of federal significance. According to Moscow law, only guardianship and guardianship, leisure, sports and youth policy are within the jurisdiction of municipalities. Everything else is in the competence of the council, which is completely controlled by the prefectures, and the prefectures, in turn, are controlled by the mayor's office. Thus, local self-government in Moscow today does not participate in solving important issues, which is contrary to federal law.

Aleksey Gusev, an independent municipal deputy of the municipal assembly of the Cheryomushki district, assesses the situation in his district as a stalemate. It is known that in these elections, United Russia, hiding their party affiliation, ran as self-nominated candidates. Thus, the Cheryomushki assembly included six “self-nominated” United Russia members lobbied by the administration, and six independent deputies. To be elected, the chairman needs eight votes. “It would seem that the situation is conducive to finding a compromise, but instead the government is putting pressure on us. The head of the council met with us and advised us to vote for the “right” candidate. He motivated this by the fact that it would be more convenient for him to work with his man. The local administration works according to the old habit, when the ruling party had a 100% presence in the assembly. Then the question of choosing a chairman was not raised at all, he was simply appointed from above, ”Gusev said.

The deputy believes that the council should go about its own business, and not influence the affairs of the municipal assembly, which, in fact, is a legislative body (the council is a territorial executive body). “I think if we give in now, we will betray the votes of our voters. In addition to performing representative functions, the chairman sets the agenda. Through it, some connections are made, deputy requests are carried out. Naturally, if there is something bad in the council or in the municipality, then it is vital for the city authorities to put their own person in the chair,” the independent deputy concluded.

There is a similar blocking stake in the Dorogomilovo area. Deputy from Yabloko Zoya Shargatova says that due to the division of votes, the chairman of the meeting still cannot be elected. “We do not want to see the pro-government deputy Nikolai Tkachuk, whom the administration imposes on us, in the chair of the chairman. We proposed an alternative candidate - "Yabloko", but the votes were again divided in half. We even frightened them that we would give up mandates and arrange re-elections, in which they would lose even more seats, ”she said, expressing fear that pressure would be exerted on those deputies whom the council considers a “weak link”. However, this is not the first time Shargatova has encountered such a split: the meeting of the last convocation was divided into two camps in exactly the same way, which is why the chairman could not be elected for a year and a half.

“The problem is much deeper, it is related to the electoral process in general. Ahead of us is the adoption of the municipal budget, which is also approved by two-thirds of the votes. If no consensus is found, the situation may repeat itself. Such alignment is in the joy of the opposition, because the blocking package forces the local authorities to fuss, think and carry out real political work, for which they, in general, are not adapted. But at the same time, we should not forget that, having joined the struggle for control over municipalities, deputies lose time to implement their election promises,” Shargatova concluded.

Thanks to the initiative of the deputy of the municipal assembly of Troparevo-Nikulino Vladimir Garnachuk - distribution of 40,000 leaflets and biographical information about municipal candidates through the mailboxes of voters - only one United Russia made it to the assembly. True, this time an attempt to conduct an illegal election of a new chairman of the assembly with the help of the ZAO prefecture was accepted by grouped self-nominated deputies and Righteous Russians.

According to the regulations, the preparation of the first meeting of the meeting is carried out by the organizing committee (3 people), which is formed from among the deputies at the general meeting of newly elected deputies. “Two deputies from the opposition and one self-nominee, bypassing the general discussion, secretly created an organizing committee. Using a letter from the chairman of the TEC, they began a detour and separate negotiations with the deputies. The group called deputies working in the civil service and in budgetary institutions to the prefecture and offered to cast their vote for one of them. This Masonic lodge, about the creation of which no one knew anything, carried out agitation and intimidated deputies using the prefecture and council. Many deputies were elected for the first time and were not familiar with the rules of the meeting,” said Garnachuk, who exposed the illegal actions of the organizing committee in time.

At the first meeting of the assembly of the Khovrino district, the obstinate deputies from the opposition, the United Russia majority decided not to call at all (which is contrary to the regulations). They secretly gathered and elected Alexander Chibizov, the secretary of the political council of the local branch of United Russia, as the chairman of the municipal assembly. Let me remind you that this council was disgraced by the fact that a week after the elections, in a room with bags with ballots of municipal deputies, several people were taken by surprise, adding ticks against the necessary names (in empty and unfinished ballots). After the incident, the opposition decided to create an alternative local parliament. Four deputies from the official assembly will move to the alternative district assembly. In addition, it will include the "under-elected" - those who lacked five or six votes to become a deputy. The mouthpiece of the new government will be the independent newspaper Khovrino.

A similar situation, according to the editor of this newspaper, Yuri Shchegolkov, was on the eve of the French Revolution, when the pro-royal Estates General was replaced by an alternative National Assembly.