Navalny and Sanctions

This about Politics, tagged , , , , was written by for on March 21, 2014

Reprinted from Facebook (2018/02/14):

While Gorbachev supports Crimea’s return, Navalny is helping the EU to compile sanctions on those who made it possible (http://www.alde.eu/uploads/media/Crimea_list_FBK_ALDE.pdf).

All ideology aside, I really do think that this marks the end of him as a serious politician. (Note that I say this as someone who unlike most pro-Putinists predicted he’d get a high result in the Moscow elections).

Reprinted from Facebook (2018/02/14):

Couple of quick notes:

(1) Agree with Alexander Mercouris that the US bought into its own propaganda of “Putin’s billions” and has visa banned/frozen the assets of Timchenko, Gunvor, Kovalchuk, Rotenbergs, and other businessmen seen as close to Putin. Looks like its following the lead of its media and Navalny on these matters.

(2) Speaking of whom, I’ve always thought those who said Navalny was a CIA asset conspiracy theorists. Considering the close correlation between his own suggestions in the NYT and those the US just sanctioned, I will now have to seriously reconsider. The only unusual thing is that it seems America’s asset is leading it by the nose, as opposed to the other way round (though this is by no means unprecedented, recall “Curveball”).

(3) At this point, it would be not only proportionate but also poetically just to visa ban those US journalists who spread the story of Putin’s billions.

(4) While noting that these steps are run completely afoul of the rule of law and due process that the West pretends to care about so much, it is my impression that the vast majority of Russians (including myself) either do not care or in fact support these sanctions. It will help Putin to nationalize the elites and (in the long-run) help Russia diversify its economy and its relationships with non-Western Powers.

Sochi-Adler Krasnaya Polyana Panorama

This about Society, tagged , , , , was written by for on February 2, 2014

There has been an unceasing campaign to denigrate the construction in the Sochi-Adler area. Incompetence, corruption, double toilets and so on and on. In all of this, few people have been shown what has been built for the total cost of 55 billion or so US Dollars. We have a preview; but first a discussion of cost.

Most Western sources claim that the real cost of the Sochi Olympics is the 55 billion and Putin is assumed to be lying when he says the cost is 6 billion or so. Now that Navalniy has his report out that claims to measure the alleged corruption, the Western media is full of wide-eyed quotations from it. But Western discussions, and Navalniy (not, I suspect, by coincidence) ignore the other stated purpose of the construction which is to create a full-scale sports and holiday complex in Russia’s Riviera. The aim being to attract Russian tourists away from foreign holidays and provide some development and employment opportunities in the chronically depressed North Caucasus.

So what is the real cost of the Olympics? 1) All of the 55 billion or 2) just the proportion that would not have been spent if the Olympics weren’t coming or 3) something in-between? The first question to be answered is how much of the total is definitely Olympics-only spending. Here Navalniy actually agrees with Putin: from his report “Olympstroy spent $6.3 bn to construct 11 sport venues”; that is the number Putin gives.

The disagreement is over what column to put the other expenditures in. Navalniy insists they all be charged to the Olympics, Putin that they be charged to resort complex construction and necessary infrastructure improvement. That’s what the disagreement actually amounts to, not that anyone in the Western media will tell you: Putin says some is Olympics, most is infrastructure, Navalniy says all is Olympics. But they agree on the total that has been spent. Putin wants to play the Olympics costs down, Navalniy wants to play them up; so each picks his favourite split. Each is being disingenuous.

Certainly an immense amount of money has been spent on sports facilities, visitor amusements, transportation facilities, hotels, restaurants and the rest. So, Dear Reader, you decide the split. How do you judge the most expensive single project (the 5-6 billion road-rail connection to the ski resort, replacing the Soviet-era link)? Would it have been built anyway to connect the town of Adler (where, as we have interminably been told, it doesn’t snow much) to the ski resort area where it does? Or do you judge that it was only built because of the Olympics? Or should only some of the cost be assigned to the Olympics and how would you assign it? How about the airport at Adler? The port development at Sochi? The isolation hospital in Lazerevskiy district? The Adler power station? The shopping mall? Putin says none, Navalniy says all but they don’t disagree that 50-plus billion was spent overall. And, when you make your decision, what makes you think the next person would agree? The only correct answer is that, when the Olympics are gone, there will still be a vast complex of modern facilities in a place and situation that ought to be pretty attractive to tourists.

The truth is that a large high quality resort complex has been constructed, together with a great deal of infrastructure created or improved; some of this was built only because the Olympics were coming. So what is the cost of the Olympics? I don’t know either. 6 billion seems too narrow a definition but 55 billion is far too high. Can we pick a number out of the sky and say 7 or 8? Certainly a ludicrous amount of money to shell out for a few weeks of sports; probably an argument for having a permanent facility but, given that there wasn’t much there in the beginning except Nature, not absurdly high as these things are priced.

These panoramic photos show what has been done. And don’t forget, Dear Reader, Navalniy and others would like us to believe that a third of the money was stolen: look at all this stuff and decide whether that sounds right.

Russian language only, but you’ll get the idea.

PS. The toilet story isn’t true.

Translation: Hurrah for the Bourgeois Candidate!

This about Politics, tagged , , , , , was written by for on September 10, 2013

In Komsomolskaya Pravda, Andrei Ryabtsev notes a close correlation between average housing prices and Navalny’s vote share in Moscow’s districts – and tries to find out why that might be the case.

Why did they vote for Navalny in the centre, and for Sobyanin in the dormitory suburbs?

The election results for Moscow’s mayor have at the same time given rise to some inquiring social-research: Where were all the protest votes concentrated?

The Moscow Election Commission has some very significant figures. It turns out that Navalny was the candidate of the respectable centre, of the prestigious Leningrad District and not of the downmarket Southwest; Sobyanin was the choice of the dormitory areas. Take, for example, the Central Administrative District. In the Arbat Precinct: for Navalny – 35.63 %; for Sobyanin – 43.53 %. Or take Basmanny: 36.1 % – for Navalny , 41.56 % – for Sobyanin. And Zamoskvorech’e: 35.41 % – for Navalny; 42.13 % – for Sobyanin. It was almost the same thing at Meshchansky, Presnensky, Tversky, Yakimanka…

However, let’s just move a little in an easterly direction, to Lefortovo, and – oop-la! It’s 51.58 % for Sobyanin, and for Navalny – 26.9%. No mention of a second round taking place there. And then we have Sokolniki, where on the eve of the election Navalny attracted perhaps the biggest mass meeting of voters: for Sobyanin – 44.06 %; for Navalny – 30.68%. It was about the same in Kuntsevo, Krylatsky, and Dorogomilovo.

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Were the 2013 Moscow Elections falsified?

This about Politics, tagged , , , , , was written by for on September 10, 2013

1. The CEC results

Here they are. The turnout was 32%.

  • Sergey Sobyanin – 51.37%
  • Alexei Navalny – 27.24%
  • Ivan Melnikov – 10.69%
  • Sergey Mitrokhin – 3.51%
  • Mikhail Degtyaryov – 2.86%
  • Nikolai Levichev – 2.79%
  • Invalid ballots – 1.53%

2. Pre-elections opinion polls:

Navalny’s support – among those who indicated a clear preference for one candidate or another – rose from the single digits in June to around 20% on the eve of the elections (Levada, VCIOM, FOM, Synovate Comcon). All the polls – even including the SuperJob poll that only queried active workers, aka excluded pro-Sobyanin pensioners – gave Sobyanin more than 50% in the first round.

His actual result massively exceeded expectations. By common consensus, this was because the “party of the couch” won; although close to 50% of Muscovites were saying they were going to vote, only 32% ended up doing so. These were mainly Sobyanin supporters who were, nonetheless, loth to shift their butts to vote for an uninspiring if competent technocrat who had ran a most lacklustre campaign.

3. Election observers

In the SMS-ЦИК program, accredited election observers would send text messages from their polling stations with numbers from the protocols at their precinct. They could then be compared with the official CEC numbers.

And Sobyanin’s result here was 49.52%.

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Moscow Exit Polls: Sobyanin ~50%, Navalny ~30%

This about Politics, tagged , , , was written by for on September 8, 2013

According to a roundup of all the major exit polls by Kommersant, it appears that although Navalny’s performance was massively better than expected, Acting Mayor Sobyanin still managed to avoid a second tour.

Exit Polls are Pubished  for the Moscow Elections

In Moscow, voting has finished for the new Mayor. According to exit polls carried out at the doors of the election stations by Alexei Navalny’s supporters, the oppositionist candidate got 35.6% of those queried. “According to the exit polls, there will be a SECOND TOUR of mayoral elections. Alexei Navalny – 35.6%, Sergey Sobyanin – 46%,” according to their Twitter. According to the Foundation of Public Opinion, the majority of Muscovites extended their sympathies towards Sergey Sobyanin – he got 52.5% of the votes, Alexei Navalny – 29.1%. The Center of Political Technologies provides the following data: 56% to the Acting Mayor of Moscow Sergey Sobyanin 56%, Alexei Navalny – 29%.

Sergey Sobyanin is leading in the Moscow elections with 53% of the votes, according to data from VCIOM’s exit polls. Alexei Navalny, according to the exit polls carried out by the organization’s workers, got 32%. “According to the results of the exit poll, the Mayor of Moscow, chosen in the first round, is Sergey Sobyanin (53% of the vote). His closest adversary, Alexei Navalny, got 32% of the vote. The other candidates’ results were far more most modest: Ivan Melnikov – 8%, Sergey Mitrokhin – 3%, Nikolai Levichev – 1%, Mikhail Degtyaryov – 1%. Some 1% of the ballots were spoiled. 27% of the respondents refused to answer,” according to VCIOM’s communique.

OPEN DISCUSSION: The Moscow Elections, 2013

This about Politics, tagged , , , , was written by for on September 5, 2013

A couple of polls to provide the fodder for the subsequent discussions.

Feel free to provide an exact figure (to one decimal place) for Navalny’s percentage share in the comments and we can have a little competition along the lines of the one we had for the Presidential elections.

Background – Sobyanin vs. Navalny in Figures (July 23 summary); last Levada poll; last WCIOM poll; last FOM poll and prediction; last Synovate Comcon poll.

Discussion thread at The Russia Debate forum – The Moscow Elections, 8 Sept 2013.

Poll #1:

moscow-elections-predictions-1

Poll #2:

moscow-elections-predictions-2

Translation: Going on the Campaign Trail with Navalny

This about Politics, tagged , , , , was written by for on August 25, 2013

According to gazeta.ru’s Olga Kuzmenkova tagging him, Navalny has a popular style and likes asking resonant questions, such as why Russia, despite its petrodollars, only builds as many railways in a year as China does in a week.

“Where are my factories? Where is my Cosmos?”

“Gazeta.Ru” observed Alexei Navalny as he went about meeting Zelenograd voters.

“Gazeta.Ru” continues a series of reports, “One day with a candidate for mayor of Moscow”. On Thursday, the correspondent of the publication, along with the candidate Alexei Navalny, underwent three meetings with voters in Zelenograd. If the opposition does not withdraw from the elections by September 8, he will have spent more than a hundred meetings with supporters. The “Gazeta.Ru” correspondent explains how Navalny campaigns.

“I thought that after a 25 minute delay, the maximum I could expect would be rotten tomatoes … And you applaud me”, said Alexei Navalny when he turned up in front of those who attended the next voter meeting with. In the whole campaign, this was the first time that he had been late. The candidate for mayor of Moscow had been a victim of traffic problems: on the way to Zelenograd his car had got stuck in a “grandiose traffic jam.” “A bus crashed into a trolley bus”, said Navalny, who was clearly uncomfortable about having been forced to wait. “And then there was no trolleybus to Pyatnitskoy”, said one of the standing women, good-naturedly.

Navalny started his election speech with saying that for him Zelenograd is a special place. “Here, my mother was born; my grandfather is buried here; as a child, I regularly went to my relatives here and spent a lot of time”, said the candidate. Having achieved the first of approving nods from the audience, Navalny went set to work.

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Translation: Did Navalny Fail to Reach an “Understanding”?

This about Politics, tagged , , , , was written by for on August 15, 2013

Izvestia’s Sergey Podosenov queries political experts as to why a new case has been launched against Navalny. The concensus is that he is becoming too popular, or violated informal understandings.

Navalny Violated Informal Arrangements

“Izvestia” sources talk about the background of the Prosecutor General Office attack upon the opposition leader.

Vladimir Zhirinovsky is known to have asked the prosecutor’s office the other day to check the sources of Alexei Navalny’s campaign funding. The Liberal Democrat opposition leader suspects about 20 million rubles have been raised, including money received from abroad. The Prosecutor General’s Office has confirmed that some of the money transferred on the internet by Navalny’s associates using foreign IP-addresses.

“Through the electronic payment system ‘Yandex.Money’ more than 300 foreign legal entities and individuals, as well as anonymous donors from 46 countries (including the United States, Finland, the UK, Switzerland and Canada) using 347 IP-addresses have transferred to Navalney’s electronic wallet as well as to those of his campaign staff N.N. Lyaskina, K.S. Jankauskas and V.L. Ashurkova money for Alexei Navalny’s election campaign as candidate for mayor of Moscow”, said Minister Yuri Chaika.

Since the law prohibits the anonymous and foreign funding of political activity, the investigation results were sent to the Interior Ministry in order to determine whether a criminal charge be made.

Navalny himself responded by indicating that the foreign IP-addresses of senders does not say anything about their citizenship. A similar opinion was expressed by the ‘Yandex.Money’ press service:

“We cannot understand by what parameters the Prosecutor General’s Office drew the conclusion that foreigners are involved … For example, if you are on holiday in Italy and are sending money from there, you still remain a Russian citizen: the ruble transfer is considered to be a domestic one.

“Be that as it may, having become involved in a matter involving the foreign funding of Navalny’s campaign, the Prosecutor General will see the matter through to the very end, namely in court”, said a Kremlin source. But Navalny will not be granted such a gift as being withdrawn from the election: that, according to the source, would not be in Sergei Sobyanin’s interests, who has already done much so as to ensure that his opponent will be able participate in the elections.

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Translation: The 35 Cyber-Friends of Navalny

This about Politics, tagged , , , , was written by for on August 9, 2013

35 CEO’s of Russian Internet companies have signed a public letter supporting Navalny in return for his promise to ensure accountability and the rule of law.

Navalny’s 35 Friends

Small businesses get involved in politics.

Thirty-five representatives of Internet businesses are to speak publicly in support of the candidate for post of Moscow mayor, Alexei Navalny. This is a precedent, as “equidistanced oligarch” businesses used not to openly try to support the opposition.

A group of 35 Internet entrepreneurs has launched a manifesto in support of Navalny. “Instead of voting from our hearts, we have made a socio-political contract”, they wrote. “Our support is not an act of charity. We expect the protection of the rule of law from Navalny, support for independent courts, and real accountability of public officials. For our part, we will support Navalny’s policy by means of our reputation and our financial, organizational and other resources.”

“The Contract” has been signed signed by the founders/owners/top managers of, amongst others: The Internet-shop “Vikimart” (Camille Kurmakaev and Maxim Faldin); the discount service Groupon and the educational portal Eduson.tv (Elena Masolova); HeadHunter.ru (Yuri Virovets); the publishing house “Mann, Ivanov and Ferber” (Mikhail Ivanov); the polling site Votepoller (Valentin Preobrazhensky); and Sports.ru (Dmitry Navosha).

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Translation: Eddie Limonov Tells Navalny Fans to Go See a Shrink

This about Politics, tagged , , was written by for on August 1, 2013

It is wrong to glamorize a political hustler with five criminal cases against him, says the National Bolshevik leader – who claims street cred on account of having done real time.

You Guys Need to Go and See a Shrink!

Eduard Limonov on why Navalny became a hero of the bourgeoisie.

I pay a lot of attention to Navalny. I do.

In so far as this Navalny phenomenon appears as a hitherto unknown symptom of our time.

The hysterical affection of the Moscow intelligentsia for this man is mysterious and has no rational roots: all causes of affection are irrational.

Well, yes, I do have personal reasons for treating Navalny negatively.

How is possible for me to be nice to him when I’ve been given time and done it? After doing only one night behind bars, Navalny was magically released from gaol the following morning.

In 2011, I said that I would be a candidate for the Russian presidential elections in March 2012.

What happened next was that the annex of the Hotel Ismailovo, where, on the initiative of a group of a people a meeting was to have taken place as regards nominating me as a candidate, was surrounded by the police, who allowed nobody to enter the room.

I still held a meeting there on the hotel car park. As was expected, more than five hundred people came with their passports; they registered themselves in a bus, and the meeting took place.

The Central Election Commission did not register me as a candidate.

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