News from the Front
Those in charge of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's public reception offices will be coordinating the Russian Popular Front. Moreover, the United Russia Party has virtually relocated its campaign headquarters to the Front, which will soon get its own office and management. Political analysts say this has been done in order to show that Putin is the man on top.
Vladimir Putin's public reception offices will become the Front's "circulatory system" in the regions, said Andrei Uvarov, Executive Committee Chairman of United Russia in the Oryol Region. Nikolai Semenets, head of Putin's reception office in the Saratov Region, also noted the new role of these reception offices. Vitaly Likhachyov and Alexander Labeikin, Deputy Speakers of the Volgograd and Oryol Regional Legislative Assembies, will coordinate the Front's activities in their areas. Tatiana Bezdetko, a Deputy of the Leningrad Regional Legislative Assembly, will also do the same. Irina Trankova, Deputy Speaker of the Voronezh Regional Legislative Assembly and head of the local United Russia office, is to resign from her second position in June and will also head the Putin reception office. State Duma Deputy Irina Sokolova, head of Putin's St Petersburg reception office, will also reportedly coordinate the Front's activities there. An alleged member of Putin's entourage, Sokolova knew State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov prior to his election as well as Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev.
Uvarov explained that Russian Popular Front offices will be set up along the lines of the reception offices and that the heads of regional reception offices will act as their coordinators, serving a similar role to that of the United Russia Party's Executive Committee. He said heads of reception offices will engage in technical and organisational work but that all members of the Front's coordinating councils were officially equal. The regions have already found an argument to justify such close attention to Putin's reception offices. Members of United Russia's Astrakhan office say city residents show up at the local reception office not to make requests but to suggest various ideas to the Front.
At the same time, United Russia's campaign headquarters has been virtually relocated to the Russian Popular Front. Vladimir Putin's spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said the Front is to receive its own office and management already this week. He added that the Front's management will be minimal but sufficient for working in the context of the organisation's regional scope.
Deputy Prime Minister Vyacheslav Volodin, who had presided over a meeting of the Front's Coordinating Council in Putin's absence, already heads the headquarters de facto.
United Russia sources said employees of the Government's Press Service and Information Department could be involved in the Front's campaigning activities, supervised by Dmitry Peskov, who has frequently commented on the situation regarding the Russian Popular Front. It should be noted that a new section about the Front's activities has already gone up on the prime minister's official website. Billboards with Vladimir Putin's quotation "Let's create the Russian Popular Front" have already been put up in Nizhny Tagil, a major city in the Sverdlovsk Region. The logo of the local "Clean City" movement can also be seen on the billboards.
Moreover, the regions have been told that the Russian Popular Front is a serious and long-term project. "It is has been in development for at least five years - the tenure of members of parliament," a United Russia source noted. In this regard, there are no time limits for organizations to submit membership applications, said Valery Radayev, Secretary of United Russia's Political Council in the Saratov Region. However, the Front's regional coordinating councils must be set up by May 25 and the regions must discuss the Front's draft declaration by June 15. Additionally, in the next couple of weeks the regions must consider the regulations on holding primaries to choose candidates for the upcoming State Duma elections, said a source in the Front's leadership. The source added that the regulations heed the interests of all member organisations.
"From the start Peskov said this implies unification around Vladimir Putin, rather than United Russia," said Yevgeny Minchenko, director of the International Political Expert Evaluation Institute. "It is important that the entire agenda revolves around him," he added. Minchenko believes that United Russia will not be weakened, and that the Front's leaders expect more substantial results from the "competition" between Putin's reception offices and the party itself.
Mikhail Vinogradov, director of the St Petersburg Politics Foundation, thinks this will enable the Front to distance itself from United Russia to some extent and to show by ideological means that Putin is the man on top.