Nezavisimaya Gazeta: “Valery Shantsev’s smoggy inauguration”
Nizhny Novgorod Region Governor Valery Shantsev will be inaugurated on Sunday. This event coincides with growing discontent with the region's head. People accuse the governor of inaction during the devastating fires in Vyksa.
Valery Shantsev's latest briefing on the wildfires only added fuel to the fire. During the briefing the governor said that he had not declined the help Vladimir Putin offered at a conference call. At that conference call, held by the prime minister, Shantsev said he could cope with the forest fires. This happened two days after a village in the Vyksa district had burned to the ground and a few days before seven other small settlements were completely or partially destroyed by fire.
Footage of the prime minister and the governor's dialogue was broadcast on various TV channels and is available on the internet, so, many residents of the Nizhny Novgorod Region have seen it. At that briefing the governor said: "I believe that my reply to the prime minister was wrongly interpreted. I never said that we didn't need the help." According to Shantsev, the Nizhny Novgorod Region was the first to receive "heavy equipment." "I had been in the Vyksa district two weeks before that. I met with the district's head and showed him from a helicopter where there was fire in his district," Shantsev told journalists.
Now Nizhny Novgorod residents are expressing their discontent with the governor on the town's web forum and have uploaded more than ten posts about him over the past few days. Among other things, users discussed a letter to the president asking for Shantsev's resignation. User Deathmaker suggested holding a flash mob on inauguration day with posters saying "Shantsev burns up!" Other discontent users came up with the idea to have T-shirts made with the inscription "We have everything under control! Valery Shantsev." The site's visitors even suggested two patterns for the T-shirts, one laconic and the other one with flames. This forum also held an opinion poll about what to give Shantsev as an inauguration present. A fire bell, a watering pot and a fire extinguisher turned out to be some of the most harmless options.
However, the promised resignation of the Vyksa district's head Alexei Sokolov has not happened yet either. On August 4 deputies at the local parliament refused to consider the resignation he submitted on his own accord and following Vladimir Putin's recommendation on the day after the prime minister's visit to Vyksa. The deputies ruled that under the current force major conditions, that fighting wildfires and helping those affected was more important than dismissing the district's head. However, they set up an ad hoc committee to review the official response to the wildfires. Sokolov himself said that despite handing in his resignation he did not admit to any fault - the district's authorities were doing everything in their power, but the fires proved to be unmanageable. However, the Prosecutor General's Office has initiated criminal proceedings on the negligence committed by the "local authorities at the Vyksa municipal district," but no officials have yet been named.
This is all happening amid the Emergency Situations Ministry's gloomy forecasts that the abnormal heat will continue and that the number of fires may increase. The Nizhny Novgorod Region currently has 16 fires across an area of 104,000 hectares. The situation in Sarov is an example of the significant forces that may be needed. Considering the area's special status, the firefighting efforts there included firefighting trains, aircraft, heavy equipment and brand-new robots, which had recently been developed by the Research Institute for Fire Protection and were used for the first time. In addition, employees of the Russian Federal Nuclear Centre, municipal officials of Sarov and soldiers were patrolling the forests searching for fires. Extinguished fires often reappear, Deputy Emergency Situations Minister Pavel Plata said. "We have to scout the same area and do the same job dozens of times. There are currently no crown fires but they could come very quickly. It takes only a light wind for the fire to spread to the tree tops," the deputy minister said. By yesterday morning firefighters had managed to extinguish the continuous fire front around Sarov and contain the fires within their previous limits. "This is a very serious fire; I flew over it yesterday," Valery Shantsev said at that briefing on August 4.
As expected, the inauguration of the Nizhny Novgorod Region governor will be hosted at the newly renovated Nizhny Novgorod State History and Architecture Museum, which used to be merchant Sergei Rukavoshnikov's mansion. The museum is to open in autumn. The work on the mansion has accelerated in the past few months. The gilding and stucco work has already been completely restored.
Svetlana Gamzayeva, Nihzny Novgorod
