Congress of the Left Front: we are not on the same path with the Coordination Council

On January 5, the 3rd Congress of the Left Front was held at the Sakharov Museum. This event promised to be a turning point in the development of the movement, because there was an objective need for structural changes. It also threatened to end in a fierce scandal, because it is no secret that the dissatisfaction of LF activists with the leadership’s policies (primarily in the field of interaction with the liberal crowd) had reached a boiling point.

Let's start with the loudest, although not the most important.

In the draft resolution distributed before the start of the congress, the majority of delegates immediately caught the eye of point No. 7 on the close cooperation of the LF with the Coordination Council. Perhaps old Cato said his phrase that “Carthage must be destroyed” fewer times than at the congress it was said: “The seventh point must be abolished.” Further, opinions on what to do with the Constitutional Court and Sergei Udaltsov, who is a member of it, differed slightly: starting with the fact that membership in this fake body should be used as a platform for promoting one’s positions, and ending with Vladislav Ryazantsev’s proposal to recognize one-time membership as unacceptable LF and in KS. By the way, if Vladislav had not made a purely formal mistake and had submitted this proposal in writing before the voting began, it is likely that this decision would have been made. This duel between moderates and radicals ended with the overwhelming majority of votes striking out the damned 7th point from the resolution of the Congress, but Sergei Udaltsov announced that in his personal capacity and without representing the LF, he remains a member of the Coordination Council. I (who, by the way, advocated ending all relations with the Constitutional Court) consider this solution to be a compromise. I hope that a number of dissatisfied people will take a sober look at the situation in a few days, especially since Sergei will still leave the Constitutional Court if necessary.

Discussions about the CS took up a lot of precious time, but I believe that it was necessary to dot the i's here.

In addition, the issue of party building was also considered. An option was proposed for the Left Front to become part of the recently registered at the federal level “ROT Front”, in the creation of which, by the way, the LF was directly involved. However, it was decided not to take drastic steps and to hold preliminary negotiations on this issue.

Lawyer Violetta Volkova spoke about the need to make some changes to the movement’s statutory documents in order to remove the claims of the prosecutor’s office checking the Left Front for extremism. Also, regarding “paper issues”, there is hope that we will soon have a revised charter

The congress ended with the resolution of the dispute in the Leningrad branch. A compromise decision was made, and there is hope that the internal absurdities will be resolved.

Among other things, the resolution of the Congress outlines a course for close cooperation and, if possible, merger with left-wing organizations. And this cannot but rejoice. In the near future, projects of the Left Front itself will be implemented, which, I want to believe, will receive support from our fellow socialists.

Unfortunately, it was simply impossible to discuss all pressing problems in more or less detail in 5 and a half to six hours, and a large gap was discovered in the preparation of materials and reports for the Congress. However, the main vectors of development of the movement have been outlined - now the word is up to the Council and the Executive Committee, who will already be working out the specific steps that we will take. So if we work, we will live.

BONUS . New composition of the Council and Executive Committee of the LF:

Left Front Council:

1. Anatoly Baranov (Moscow)

2. Dmitry Galkin (Moscow)

3. Andrey Demidov (Leningrad)

4. Heydar Dzhemal (Moscow)

5. Zinaida Zayakina (Moscow)

6. Karin Klement (Leningrad)

7. Konstantin Kosyakin (Moscow)

8. Vasily Kuzmin (Moscow)

9. Daria Mitina (Moscow)

10. Ilya Ponomarev (Moscow)

11. Alexey Prigarin (Moscow)

12. Alexey Sakhnin (Moscow)

13. Sergey Udaltsov (Moscow)

14. Dmitry Cherny (Moscow)

15. Alexander Shubin (Moscow)

16. Dmitry Pechinsky (Krasnodar)

17. Vladislav Ryazantsev (Rostov-on-Don)

18. Alexander Krasnov (Nizhny Novgorod)

19. Andrey Rudoy (Nizhny Novgorod)

20. Mikhail Kanev (Komi)

21. Dmitry Chuvilin (Bashkortostan)

22. Alexander Cherepanov (Tyumen)

23. Mikhail Savelkov (Tyumen)

24. Yulia Perkova (Novosibirsk)

25. Ilya Zhuravlev (Ivanovo)

26. Nail Imameev (Ulyanovsk)

27. Nikolay Sosnov (Vladivostok)

28. Arthur Dron (Yakutia)

29. Roman Yukhnovets (Kaliningrad)

30. Margarita Narkevich (Penza)

31. Anton Skhiviya (Saratov)

32. Boris Kislyakov (Kursk)

33. Andrey Svistunov (Mari-El)

34. Vyacheslav Kazakov (Tatarstan)

35. Anastasia Maltseva (Perm)

36. Mikhail Archakov (Blagoveshchensk)

37. Igor Tsevmenko (Belgorod)

38. Victor Kleutin (Kemerovo)

39. Mikhail Voskresensky (Samara)

40. Alexander Semukhin (Ekaterinburg)

41. Alexander Shipkov (Chelyabinsk)

42. Vladimir Makhov (Moscow)

43. Ekaterina Mochalova (Moscow)

44. Irina Khanutina (Moscow)

45. Yuri Surkov (Moscow region)

46. ​​Dmitry Konnov (Tver)

47. Yaroslav Koklyunov (Volgograd)

48. Dmitry Kudrenok (Belarus)

49-52. Leningrad (reserve)

Executive Committee of the Left Front:

1. Dmitry Galkin (Moscow)

2. Andrey Demidov (Leningrad)

3. Konstantin Kosyakin (Moscow)

4. Vasily Kuzmin (Moscow)

5. Daria Mitina (Moscow)

6. Vladimir Makhov (Moscow)

7. Alexey Prigarin (Moscow)

8. Alexey Sakhnin (Moscow)

9. Sergey Udaltsov (Moscow)

10. Alexander Cherepanov (Tyumen)

11. Ilya Zhuravlev (Ivanovo)

12. Margarita Narkevich (Penza)

13. Vladislav Ryazantsev (Rostov-on-Don)

14. Dmitry Chuvilin (Bashkortostan)

15. Alexander Krasnov (Nizhny Novgorod)

16. Alexander Shubin (Moscow)

17. Andrey Svistunov (Mari-El)

18. Alexander Semukhin (Ekaterinburg)

19-20. Leningrad (reserve)