The Real Russia. Today. How Boris Nemtsov's last political party died, Kremlin-funded rap videos, and Medvedchuk's sugar momma

Friday, September 7, 2018

This day in history. September 7, 1812, marked the bloodiest battle of the French invasion of Russia, when more than 250,000 troops clashed at Borodino, resulting in at least 70,000 casualties. Napoleon captured Moscow seven days later, but it proved to be a pyrrhic victory.

• Boris Nemtsov's old party is about to lose its last seat in Russian politics
• The Kremlin allegedly paid two million rubles for this rap video
• The wife of a famously pro-Kremlin Ukrainian politician has a sweet oil drilling deal in Russia
• Ahead of elections, St. Petersburg officials withdraw protest permit issued to opponents of Russian pension reform
• Kemerovo firefighters on trial for negligence also colluded against investigators, prosecutors say

Opposition DOA 💀

“Parnas” (the People's Freedom Party) was built on the foundation of one of Russia’s oldest liberal political parties: the Republican Party of Russia. In the 1990s, RPR had seats in the State Duma, but in 2007 it lost its registration, not long after lawmakers imposed a minimum membership threshold on political parties that RPR couldn’t reach.

Four years later, however, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that RPR had been liquidated illegally, and in 2012 the Russian Supreme Court reinstated the party’s registration, leading to the formation of “RPR-Parnas.” The new entity’s two co-chairs were longtime RPR leader Vladimir Ryzhkov and the former top government officials Mikhail Kasyanov and Boris Nemtsov.

In 2013, Parnas helped Navalny run for mayor of Moscow, and it was through this party that Boris Nemtsov won a seat in the Yaroslavl regional parliament

In the early 2010s, the leaders and activists behind Parnas were constantly involved in the Moscow protest movement. In the spring of 2013, Parnas used its status as an officially registered political party to nominate Alexey Navalny for a spot on the ballot in the Moscow mayoral election, obviating the need to collect 73,000 signatures endorsing his candidacy as an independent. Navalny went on to win 27 percent of the vote in the first round, nearly forcing a runoff election against the incumbent, Sergey Sobyanin.

In the fall of 2013, Boris Nemtsov staged an equally major campaign in Yaroslavl, where he managed to win a seat on the regional parliament. Nemtsov’s victory made Parnas the country’s only “non-systemic” opposition party legally empowered to nominate State Duma candidates without collecting public signatures.

The party was plagued by infighting that only got worse after Boris Nemtsov’s assassination

In February 2014, Vladimir Ryzhkov left the party, accusing Nemtsov and Kasyanov of trying to remove him from the leadership. He took many of his supporters with him, including economist Sergey Aleksashenko and Valentina Melnikova, the chairperson of Russia’s Union of the Committees of Soldiers' Mothers.

A year later, Boris Nemtsov was shot and killed in downtown Moscow, robbing the party of its most influential and talented mediator. Afterwards, the situation at Parnas (which dropped “RPR” from its name after Ryzhkov departed) only got worse. Next, Ilya Yashin (one of Nemtsov’s longtime associates) briefly joined the party as a co-chairman.

Campaigning for seats in the next State Duma was a disaster, with a nationalist populist winning the party’s primaries

Ahead of Russia’s 2016 parliamentary elections, the party’s co-chairmen argued bitterly and publicly. Yashin lobbied for full-fledged closed primaries, but Kasyanov would only consent if his name still appeared first on the party’s national ticket, whatever the primary’s results. Rejecting this idea, Yashin and several of his supporters left the party.

Parnas nevertheless held primaries, and victory went unexpectedly to a nationalist populist in Saratov named Vyacheslav Maltsev, prompting yet another exodus of party members. In Russia’s September 2016 elections, Parnas won 0.73 percent of the vote. It fielded candidates in 112 single-mandate races and lost every one. By November 2017, Maltsev was out of Parnas and calling on his supporters to occupy the streets until the overthrow of Vladimir Putin. The “revolution” ended in debacle, with Maltsev fleeing to Europe and many of his fans landing behind bars.

Parnas hasn’t won a single election at any level anywhere in Russia since 2013

In August 2018, the Yaroslavl branch of Parnas tried to register candidates for regional parliamentary elections on September 9. The rival groups LDPR and “Patriots of Russia” then challenged the Parnas party ticket in court, claiming that its candidates list violated certain regulations.

On August 28, the Yaroslavl Regional Court removed Parnas from the elections. The party appealed the verdict, but on September 7 Russia’s Supreme Court upheld the decision, meaning that Parnas is now definitively out of the race. Later this month, as soon as the mandate won by Boris Nemtsov expires, Parnas will need to collect signatures like any other opposition group, if it wishes to field candidates for public office at any level.

Climb the ladder to success, Kremlin style 🎙️

The Kremlin’s domestic policy machinations often lead the Putin administration down some strange PR roads. For example, Meduza has written before about the authorities’ hopes to recruit Elizaveta Gyrdymova — aka “Monetochka” (Lil’ Coin) — as the country’s next pop star. That initiative hit a bump in the road earlier this summer when Gyrdymova bowed out of a concert linked to the Defense Ministry, but the Kremlin’s efforts to build inroads with popular musicians aren’t limited to one talent.

On September 7, the BBC Russian Service reported that the rapper Vyacheslav Mashnov (better known as “Gnoiny” and “Slava KPSS”) received nearly two million rubles (almost $30,000) from the Putin administration to release “Sobolev Diss Challenge” on YouTube this April. The BBC first learned of the deal from an anonymous source, and Stanislav Smolyaninov (the rapper’s concert director) later confirmed the claims.

Smolyaninov says Mashnov’s cooperation with the Kremlin was a one-time affair, complaining that the authorities shortchanged them. “We won’t make another deal because the government didn’t pay us the stipulated amount the first time,” he told the BBC.

So what's this music video about?

Mashnov's April 18 video targets the video-blogger Nikolai Sobolev, saying that he “spreads info like a plague-sick rat.” The “diss” was likely a response to Sobolev's role in spreading conspiracy theories about the shopping mall fire in Kemerovo that killed 40 people on March 25. Two days after the tragedy, Sobolev shared a video on YouTube accusing the local authorities of hiding the true casualty count, which he said was “in the hundreds.” The video attracted five million views within a day, which is how long it took until Sobolev removed it, after the rumors proved to be untrue.

Mashnov and his friends in the “Antihype” rap group have denied taking any Kremlin money for the “Sobolev Diss Challenge.” The rapper “SD,” meanwhile, wrote on Twitter that the Putin administration offered 20 million rubles ($287,600) to the rapper Andrey Zamai for the music video “Porokh” (Gunpowder). But the money was never received, he says. On September 7, Mashnov tweeted cautiously: “They're buying park ads from Sobolev, and the diss here is aimed at him. The Kremlin is just keeping the party going online.” He also promised to share a new video on September 8, though it's unclear if he plans to address the allegations that he took government money.

Citing Kremlin sources, the BBC’s report names several other musicians and video-bloggers who have worked for the government, including YouTubers Amiran Sardarov, Nikolai Sobolev, Sasha Spilberg, and Yuri Khavansky, and rappers Ptakha and Egor Krid. Spokespeople for these entertainers either denied the allegations or refused to comment.

Ironically, Nikolai Sobolev has also collaborated with the Russian authorities. In early July, he shared a video praising the renovations to Gorky Park carried out during Mayor Sergey Sobyanin's tenure. Sobolev later claimed that he'd only agreed to promote the park, and not any political campaign. Sobyanin is up for reelection on September 9.

Wives in high places 🛢️

The television presenter Oksana Marchenko (who’s married to the pro-Russia Ukrainian politician Viktor Medvedchuk) apparently owns a company that’s developing one of the biggest oil deposits in Russia’s Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug.

According to a new joint investigation by journalists from Radio Liberty and UA: Pershy, Marchenko is the sole proprietor of a Cyprus-based offshore that owns 50.1 percent of the “NZNP Trade” LLC, which three years ago won a procurement contract to drill for oil in the Gavrikovsky oilfield — the third biggest deposit in the whole region, and home to an estimated 123.7 million tons of oil.

According to the newspaper Kommersant, one of the conditions of the drilling contract was that the winner must refine the oil in the Rostov region. At the time of the deal, there were only two oil refineries in Rostov, one of which was affiliated with NZNP Trade. A Rosneft subsidiary initially tried to challenge this condition in court, but the company later dropped its lawsuit.

Who’s Viktor Medvedchuk? According to Ukrainian journalists, Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev’s wife were named as the godparents of Medvedchuk’s daughter in 2004. Medvedchuk has previously represented eastern Ukraine’s separatists in negotiations with the Ukrainian government, and he’s believed to be extremely close with Vladimir Putin.

Protest permits: now you have one, now you don't 🎩

City officials in St. Petersburg have withdrawn a permit issued for a September 9 protest against the Russian government’s plan to raise the country’s retirement age. The mayor’s office says a nearby water main burst, flooding a roadway that leads into Lenin Square, where the demonstration is scheduled to take place. The authorities say organizers can hold their rally at Udelny Park (about five miles farther from the city’s center), but any attempt to stage the event at Lenin Square will be treated as an illegal public assembly.

Organizers say they’re going ahead with plans to assemble at Lenin Square, pointing out that the damaged water pipe isn’t in the square itself and poses no obstacle. The activists also insist that they’ve already spent “a considerable sum of money” to promote a Sunday protest at Lenin Square. If City Hall refuses to honor its permit, organizers say they are prepared to go to court and demand compensation.

Supporters of the anti-corruption activist Alexey Navalny are staging nationwide protests on September 9 against a plan endorsed by Vladimir Putin to raise Russia’s retirement age from 60 to 65 for men, and from 55 to 60 for women. Officials in Moscow refused to issue a permit for Navalny’s rally on September 9, which is also when millions of Russians will vote in local and regional elections. Navalny will miss both the protests and the election, as he’s currently serving a 30-day jail sentence for organizing an “unsanctioned protest” in January. His arrest last month was presumably timed to keep him off the streets for the September 9 events.

Emergency colluders 👨‍🚒

The 11 firefighters now on trial in Kemerovo are apparently conspiring to thwart investigators, a prosecutor claimed at one suspect’s hearing on Friday, according to the news agency TASS. The emergency responders charged with violating agency regulations and failing to perform their duties have allegedly coordinated their testimonies to “mislead” police and “withhold evidence.” Prosecutors say they have evidence of this collusion.

The Kemerovo fire isn’t just a local tragedy

The fire killed 60 people, including 40 children. Meduza correspondent Irina Kravtsova was on the ground, speaking to parents, as firefighters were still putting out the blaze. Afterwards, a series of nationwide inspections turned up fire-safety violations at roughly half of all shopping centers in Russia, leading officials to shut down a third of all malls.