‘Those who defend human rights deny us the right to our destiny’

On the ground in Grozny for Chechnya's mass rally against the liberal opposition

On Friday, January 22, Chechnya's capital hosted a mass rally in support of the republic's ruler, Ramzan Kadyrov. The demonstration was also a protest against Russia's liberal opposition, whom Kadyrov has branded “enemies of the people” and “traitors.” In Chechnya, the rally has been described as proof that the people stand by their leader and fully endorse his harsh comments about oppositionists. Chechnya's Interior Ministry says that 1 million people attended the event, though the actual number of people who came is far lower. Demonstrators carried a variety of banners with slogans against “liberals,” though many people holding these signs couldn't define the word. Meduza's special correspondent Ilya Zhegulev reports from on the ground at the rally in Chechnya.

By Thursday, the entire Chechen government was working toward a single purpose: Friday's demonstration. “You didn't come at the greatest time. Today we're preparing for the rally. Our hands are completely full,” a Chechen official told me, when I asked for a meeting with the representatives of the local Ministry of Industry, to talk about the region's economy.

Big contributions came in from all over to make the rally happen. “We were up into the morning hours drawing banners and signs for SWAT police,” an employee at a designer firm told me, explaining that the security forces had asked for some (pro bono) help. Chechnya's Ministry of the Press got a special assignment: prepare roughly 60 slogans and then disseminate them throughout the whole republic. When this information leaked beyond the agency, management tried to hunt down the source of the leak, thoroughly checking every employee's computer.

While his bosses looked for him, the man who leaked the information contacted me anonymously, saying Press Minister Dzhambulat Umarov even reached out to staff with a message over WhatsApp, where he explained that the state can't be an “outside observer” during the rally. Umarov said any officials taking part in the demonstration would be serving as a “people's patrol” whose main task is preventing random attacks on the offices and representatives of human rights organizations and opposition forces. The slogans, he said, only went through the Press Ministry to make sure they contained no extremism or calls to violence.

But the people who showed up at Friday's rally were peaceful. Initial reports claimed that 750,000 were in attendance. At 9 a.m., however, an hour before the event was scheduled to kick off, there were barely 200 people standing near the front stage. By 10 a.m., more people started showing up in neat little rows. Some folks got lost. “Can you tell me where the fourth row is?” one woman asked me, warily glancing at a group of people carrying a banner that read, “Stay out of the fifth column!”

The square facing the “Heart of Chechnya” mosque filled up, but the crowd was sparse. People who had attended a similar protest last year against the caricatures in the French magazine Charlie Hebdo said there were far fewer people this time. The Chechen Interior Ministry reported that more than 1 million people attended the rally, but I could see with my own eyes that there were maybe 100,000 people, at most, in the square.

The speaker's stage wasn't elevated, and it disappeared from view entirely, as soon as demonstrators raised their banners and signs into the air. Instead of looking at the stage, most people just talked amongst themselves. That's how I met a man named Ibrahim, who confessed to me that he works in Chechnya's Security Council. He said he came to the rally during his off hours. “I came because I think it's better to stop all this at the root.” “Stop what?” I asked him. “What do you mean ‘stop what’? [The liberal radio station] Echo of Moscow is planning to push for Kadyrov's ouster.”

There were lots of different signs and banners. A few of them were hand drawn, but most were printed out (in the same font) on green and white paper. The most mentioned oppositionists were anti-corruption activist Alexey Navalny and Ilya Yashin, the deputy chairman of the political party Parnas. This was probably the first rally in history that showered Yashin in so much attention. Some banners included portraits of oppositionists—both illustrations and photographs. Naturally, all of them were labeled “enemies.” Even before the rally, Navalny got a kick out of a banner that read, “If Navalny goes free, it's bad for you and me.” The woman carrying the sign didn't hide the fact that she works for the Chechen government. She told me that she came to the rally “at the bidding of her heart.”

“The lie of a single freak drives a whole people up the wall,” read the inscription on another banner, next to which someone inadvertently carried a portrait of Ramzan Kadyrov.

There were other faces on other posters, too. A housewife named Fariza, carrying a sheet of paper that criticized politically active Russian rock legend Andrey Makarevich, confided in me that she used to love Makarevich's band, Time Machine, but now she can't stand the man because he “discredits the government.”

The biggest problem ordinary people at the demonstration seemed to have was understanding who exactly the “liberals” are, though it was easy enough to grasp from Chechnya's authorities that liberals are to blame for all the country's troubles. When I put this question to a goodnatured older woman carrying a sign that said “The liberal wants to crucify this country!” she smiled, shrugged, and hurried to toss her poster on the ground.

Another elderly woman then intervened on her behalf. “The biggest liberal is [politician Vladimir] Zhirinovsky! Zhirinovsky was for the war and against Kadyrov! And after him there's [Mikhail] Khodorkovsky. It's a shame they let him go abroad. They should have kept him locked up,” she explained.

“So they ought to lock up Zhirinovsky, too?” I asked her.

The woman smiled, revealing a mouthful of gold teeth, and softly ran her finger across her throat, apparently hinting that Zhirinovsky is as mortal as anyone.

At the rally, I also managed to speak with Makka Naaurbiyeva, who lives about 45 miles northwest of Grozny. “We live well. Everybody has iPhones and tablets. You want to tell me that this is bad?” she said. One of her colleagues walked up to us and asked me, “Hey, are you a friend or an enemy?”

Another man carried a sign that read “Liberals in the government mean a crisis in the economy.” He was taken aback when I asked him if his sign meant he is against the government in Moscow.

“No, of course not,” he said. “But,” I fired back, ”[Economic Development Minister] Alexei Ulyukayev, [Finance Minister] Anton Siluanov, and Central Bank head Elvira Nabiullina all support liberal policies. Are they the ones who are leading the country into a crisis?”

“No! C'mon,” he said, waving his hand. “There are good liberals, too. But there are also bad ones. Look at me: I'm a Chechen and I'm good. But a Chechen could also be a gangster.”

Our deliberations were interrupted by the next speaker to take the stage. Right off the bat, he laid into the liberal opposition, saying, “It was these people who decided to pull tear our state and our sovereignty. They're the ones who run their mouths against our national leaders: President Putin and our national and spiritual leader, Ramzan Kadyrov. We won't stand for any coup! We have a national leader! Allahu Akbar!”

At this time, a group of middle-aged Chechens stopped paying attention to the stage and crowded together, beginning a Dhikr, singing a prayer and moving in a circle. Demonstrators nearby respectfully stood aside.

State Duma deputy Adam Delimikhanov took the stage and announced, “We all remember when Petr Stolypin took the podium in parliament and said, ‘We need no great upheavals. We need a great Russia!’ Allahu Akbar!”

Other speakers at the rally included representatives from the neighboring republics Ingushetia, North Ossetia, and Dagestan, as well as Communist Party State Duma deputy Leonid Kalashnikov and Chechen Interior Minister Ruslan Alkhanov, who cried out emotionally, speaking Chechen, “Ramzan Akhmatovich Kadyrov is Russia's national leader!”

A priest from the Russian Orthodox Church was also on hand, telling the crowd, “Those who defend human rights deny us the right to our destiny.”

The motorcycle gang leader Alexander “The Surgeon” Zaldostanov also made a surprise appearance. The leader of the “Night Wolves” biker group explained that the only response to Russia's enemies is “our unity and solidarity with Russia's president.” Zaldostanov was also inspired to cite scripture, saying that the people would never forgive traitors, “just as Judas was not forgiven.” “Once again, we'll have to fight for our freedom,” he told the crowd. “For freedom from American democracy.”

The man of the hour, Ramzan Kadryov, never appeared at the demonstration. The most senior Chechen state official in attendance turned out to be Magomed Daudov, the speaker of Chechnya's parliament. Daudov, age 35 and known by the nickname “Lord,” is considered to be one of the closest people to Kadyrov. At the rally, Daudov named a long list of people whom he describes as “traitors” and puppets of the West: Alexey Navalny, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Alexey Venediktov (the chief editor of the radio station Echo of Moscow), Igor Kalyapin (the chairman of the Committee to Prevent Torture), Duma deputy Ilya Ponomarev, Ilya Yashin, Garry Kasparov, satirist Viktor Shenderovich, Mikhail Kasyanov (former prime minister and chairman of the opposition party Parnas), Svetlana Gannushkina (chairperson of the Civil Assistance Committee), Alexey Shaburov (chief editor of the news agency Politsovet), Evegeniya Albats (chief editor of The New Times), and "all the rest of that company of national traitors.”

The meeting lasted about an hour. After it was announced that the event had ended, people started pushing their way to the stage. It turns out that three-time freestyle wrestling champion Buvaisar Saitiyev was there, and fans wanted a photograph with him. “We're going to break the stage!” he said, frightened and surrounded by a crowd of admirers. The rally's one microphone was now being used for announcements about people who'd become lost in the crowd. In just 10 minutes, everyone had dispersed, dumping their signs and banners along the pillars and lawn of the great mosque that looms over the city.

Ilya Zhegulev

Grozny