Petersburg without Beglov and Putin: what is the conflict of the governor and city elites.

Alexander Beglov. Photo: Komsomolskaya Pravda / Global Look Press

The head of St. Petersburg Alexander Beglov is one of the most famous Russian governors. A Russian not particularly interested in politics will call the Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin, Beglov, his governor and, possibly, the head of the Moscow Region Andrei Vorobyov, among the regional leaders of Moscow. Almost every citizen heard something about Uncle Sasha from the northern capital, who speaks out of place, scares the opposition, distributes shovels to officials and who has been able to cope with the city economy for a year. But if earlier the St. Petersburg authorities criticized foreign agents and anonyms from telegram channels, now the truth about Beglova and his subordinates is previously completely loyal to the Kremlin and Smolny (the administration of Petersburg is located in this palace), which are considered affiliated with the authoritative businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin and, again in the authoritative (although slightly different) Kovalchuki brothers. Two critical songs about the horror of the city being done in St. Petersburg were released by singer Sergei Shnurov, who has long been considered quite loyal power to the figure (which he himself declares in one of the indicated compositions).

Winter against the governor

This is not to say that now something special is happening in St. Petersburg. Problems with snow and ice cleaning have not stopped since Governorship Valentina Matvienko. Each snowfall for mothers and fathers of the city turned into a terrible natural disaster, which was strongly impossible to cope with. Accordingly, the consequences of the elements were beaten by residents who had to wander every winter through snow blocks or ice barriers. Beglov did not sport in the first winter (at that moment he was in the status of the acting head of St. Petersburg) - heavy snowfall fell on the city. The public utilities with its consequences, of course, did not cope. The acting governor criticized the previous leadership of the city and gave his subordinates the tools - “Beglov’s shovels” (this phrase was really written on shovels). Naturally, such measures in cleaning the city helped poorly, and the Petersburgers have cursed all winter in 2019, the unkind word was removing both Beglov and his shovels. Even then, the Kremlin officials tried to convince Vladimir Putin to pick up a better governor for St. Petersburg-a more economic one, or at least a person with a well-suspended tongue that could clearly explain why something did not come out. Putin did not give his old acquaintance at the work in the St. Petersburg city hall - it was said to be “chosen Beglov”, then choose Beglov (although when appointing him, the president emphasized that the decision to participate in the elections would be made later, according to the first results of work; apparently, the presidential results were arranged).

Subscribe to read the whole

Make a subscription Redefine.media to read Republic

Subscribe [you can pay for a Russian or foreign card. The subscription is extended automatically. You can unsubscribe at any time.]

Where are the money subscribers going

Most Republic materials are available by paid subscription. We believe that this is a good way to finance media. After all, as you know, if you have not paid for reading it, then someone else paid for you to read it. In our case, everything is honest: from your money, salaries and fees are paid to journalists, and they write about important and interesting topics for you.

The key feature of our subscription: your money is distributed between Republic magazines depending on how you read it. If you read the materials of one magazine, then your money will go only to him, while others will not go. That is, you finance only what you are interested in.

Republic uses the Redefine.media subscription. For design, we will redirect you to the Redefine.media website, where you will need to register and pay for the subscription. Authorization on the Redefine.Media website will allow you to read Republic materials from the same device.

A year subscription is more profitable than a month. And if you want to unsubscribe, this can always be done in your personal account.