At the meeting of the State Council on Friday, President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin set forth their views about the current state of the political system and the directions of its future development. Medvedev ordered the parties and governors to analyze whether party representation in the regions meets the requirements of the voters and to promote political competition. Putin called for "sound conservatism" in the efforts to modernise the political system and renounced all charges of the opposition against United Russia.
Opening the meeting, Medvedev said that the performance of the political system "is far from ideal, but it is working." He recalled that "effective decisions aimed at consolidating and merging parties" were made in the last few years. As a result, the number of parties decreased from 48 to 7 since 2004, and "their influence has grown substantially."
Furthermore, Medvedev explained that not only party functionaries but also governors representing United Russia should understand that the country's modernisation requires "the quality of democratic institutions, adequate representation of the public's interests, and a responsible and honest approach to the choice of methods of political struggle." He added that smart people will build a smart economy and that politics should also become "smarter and more flexible." "We should not try to command society, but to cooperate with it," he emphasized and went on: "But regrettably, in practice we often see a different approach: attempts to control increasingly intricate social processes with primitive and, I'd even say, stupid administrative methods."
The president demanded that the governors should cooperate with all, even the least numerous parties in the regions, and allow the parties that were not elected to the local parliaments to express their views there. "Even if half a percent of the electors vote for these parties, these are our citizens and the authorities should hear their opinion," he said.
Then Medvedev switched to party representation in local parliaments, a subject he had raised in his address to the Federal Assembly. "We have amazing legislative assemblies with a single registered parliamentary party. I think that one parliamentary party is not enough for any region. There are people with different views who vote for other parties. Maybe two is not enough, either," he said.
The president also mentioned the Moscow parliament: "Do two parliamentary parties in the Moscow City Duma reflect all the diversity of the Muscovites' political views? To be honest, I doubt it." Yury Luzhkov, the mayor of Moscow, listened to the president with a straight face, staring fixedly in front of himself. In the meantime, Medvedev did not change the subject. "Of course, it is possible to explain this by a low turnout. However, a low voter turnout is a political problem as such. We must understand whether we have done everything for the opinion of the voters to be considered in full and not be distorted, as the principles of democracy require," he said.
The opposition had its share of criticism. The president said that as distinct from regional legislative assemblies, there is no diversity at all in political representation at the level of local self-government – almost half of the 246,000 deputies are from United Russia. He explained it by "the very poor performance of some parties, primarily from among the opposition, at the municipal levels and the absence of real political competition there."
As for the regional elections in October, Medvedev said that statements by the opposition about massive fraud remained unconfirmed and that the results of the voting "generally reflect the real alignment of the political forces in the country."
He asked the opposition "to refrain from sweeping accusations against the electoral system" and invited them to take all matters to court.
Party leaders were obviously inspired by the president's statements on "stupid administrative commands." "Quite an effort must have been made to curb political life in the country if 20 years after the start of the market reforms, we hear reports about full unanimity! And this is in multi-million Moscow! Again we hear about the complete 'unity of party and the people,'" Sergei Mironov, the leader of A Just Russia said with generous indignation. Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov said that the legal system acts as the big stick itself, and his party members are sued for huge sums of money for their statements in articles and speeches. Leader of the Liberal Democratic Party Vladimir Zhirinovksy maintained that outrage and violence dominate the life of people a thousand kilometers away from the Kremlin: "People are scared because the police, prosecutors, and the courts are siding with certain political forces."
Putin suddenly took the floor at the end of the meeting. He said right away that complaints about "the harassment of political leaders" will not pass unnoticed: "Representatives of the government are not above reproach. There are examples among them of those who were criminally prosecuted and convicted to prison terms. This applies to regional leaders from the same ruling party. There should be no exceptions here at all." Putin advised the opposition not to look for truth on the web, half of which is porn, but "to go to courts with evidence."
Putin bluntly rejected all accusations that United Russia has monopolised power. He recalled that the government consults all parties in the Duma and outside it "on vital issues" and that during the crisis, United Russia did not freeze pensions and salaries but "channeled enormous sums into reforming the pension system."
"As for the party's being close to the people, this issue is decided at elections. If the people vote for the party, then it is close to them. If not, it is a group of people united by certain ideas that have not yet received steady support of the voters," Putin said, defending the party he leads.
He agreed that the political system must be adjusted but this should be done with caution so as "to prevent Russia's political life from following the Ukrainian example and sliding down into totalitarian and despotic rule." "Any effective political system should be based on sound conservatism. It should not tremble like jelly at every touch," he warned.
Party leaders had different opinions on the results of the meeting. Zyuganov told Kommersant that he was satisfied with the president's honest statement about the need to modernise the political system. Zhirinovsky was more straightforward: "They could have criticised United Russia and governors to make them stop lashing out at the opposition." Yabloko leader Sergei Mitrokhin did not appreciate the prime minister's appeal for "sound conservatism" in the political reform. However, he was glad that the non-parliamentary opposition was given an opportunity to speak at the meeting of the State Council: "It's a good thing that we have this opportunity to discuss key issues of national development directly with the leaders."
Irina Granik