Politics in Russia: power, lobby, conflicts. Issue No (36) 672

August 27 – September 2, 2007

Main political trends of the week

Last week political parties and government players were on their toes, whereas «successor» status challengers showed moderate energy.

Sergei Ivanov has cemented his leadership in the race of «successors.» The main reason for that is not his multiple appearance in the news but his strengthening reputation of the «president’s shadow.» In particular, last week the head of state and the first vice premier once again appeared at a high-status event together – State Council conference in Astrakhan, where Sergei Ivanov was virtually following every president’s step. In his turn, on the Day of Knowledge Dmitry Medvedev was visiting schools in the company of Information and Communications Minister Leonid Reiman.

However, Vladimir Putin may be preparing another unexpected rotation of staff, which will radically change the existing alignment of forces.

The «sensation of the week» was Aleksei Mitrofanov’s move from LDPR to The Just Russia. Now that Mitrofanov has left the party, the «purge» in the Liberal-Democratic Party that started in fall 2006 may be considered over. LDPR has a new donor (Viktor Baturin instead of Suleiman Kerimov) as well as a new power broker (Vladimir Zhirinovsky himself instead of Yegor Solomatin). The outflow of key figures out of the LDPR Duma faction was the consequence of that «purge» and was largely linked with the obscure chances of the party in the upcoming general election. Nevertheless, LDPR does have odds to overcome the 7% barrier even without serious administrative support «from the top.»

Last week, The United Russia began to draw preliminary results of its primaries. The main trend that the party revealed was the correlation between voting results and the dominating public preferences. Hence, party’s members (at least those, who took part in the poll) may be considered representatives of the Russian society.

Government players showed efforts trying to win more authority. Specifically, Prosecutor General Yuri Chaika announced that the murders of Anna Politkovskaya, Paul Khlebnikov, and Andrei Kozlov were solved, noting that among the suspects were MVD and FSB officers. Chaika has also launched raids in the banks that offer consumer credits. It is also worth noting that the recently established anti-corruption division inside the General Prosecutor’s Office has been headed by a «heavyweight» player Alexander Anikin.

The group of government staff controllers is also expanding quite successfully. In particular, apart from competent neutralization of possible negative consequences to image after the death of Private Sergei Sinkonen at the Plesetsk-based space center, representatives of this elite clan succeeded trying to prolong the authority of anti-corruption panel headed by Presidential Aide Viktor Ivanov and win the right to prepare software for the EGAIS program.

Head of Central Bank Sergei Ignatyev has also achieved significant success. Last week Deputy Head of the Bank Tatyana Paramonova - a member of the former CB’s head Viktor Geraschenko’s team – resigned, leaving behind attempts to tune in cooperation with Ignatyev.

Major events Aug 27, 2007 - Sep 02, 2007

Volume: 17 pages