Kommersant: “Vladimir Putin’s supporters woo the public”
The election headquarters of presidential candidate Vladimir Putin has approved the leaders of regional headquarters and discussed his first policy article. Putin's stamp of approval marks the start of the active election phase. According to the approved schedule, each leader will tour 10-15 cities for meetings with the target audience.
Yesterday, Putin's election headquarters led by State Duma Deputy Stanislav Govorukhin met to launch the next stage in the election campaign. Kommersant reported on Jan. 16 that the establishment of Putin's regional election headquarters was nearly complete and they would soon start working. The majority of the 83 leaders who were approved yesterday are public figures, university rectors and trade union functionaries. The list has not been published yet, according to information available to Kommersant, and one leader who heads a company in the space industry, could be fired. Putin's supporters will now start working with the target audience. They will operate in geographical districts in some regions and in election districts in others. Nineteen members of the central headquarters will tour areas on which the election results strongly hinge, each visiting 10-15 cities.
Teacher Lyudmila Bokova and Dr Leonid Roshal did not attend the meeting because they were already working in the regions. Vyacheslav Lysakov, the head of the Russian Automobile Society and a State Duma deputy representing the Popular Front, will campaign for Putin among cab drivers in Murmansk, Syktyvkar, Chita, Arkhangelsk, Irkutsk and several other cities.
"They comprise 1 million people, plus their families, which is a large target audience," he said. "I intend to propose amendments to the legislation regulating the taxi business. There is much to talk about."
According to Kommersant, Putin will likely discuss transport issues at a meeting with the public and State Duma deputies today.
Nadezhda Korneyeva, the deputy chair of the Patriots of Russia party and a member of the central headquarters, will rely on regional party branches during her planned visits. She will go to Krasnoyarsk where she headed Congress of Russian Communities (KRO) leader Sergei Glazyev's election headquarters during the 2002 gubernatorial election, to Khakassia, where her party has a regional branch, and to Khanty-Mansiysk and Novosibirsk, where its branches stand in opposition to the regional authorities.
"I will also visit the regions where my party's supporters have unsettled issues with the local authorities," she said. "I am ready to take their mandates to the governors."
The members of the central headquarters also discussed Putin's article published yesterday on his election site and also by Izvestia. Dmitry Peskov, his press secretary, said that the article explaining why Putin had decided to run for president would be followed by an address to the middle class.
The headquarters decided not to ask United Russia to contribute to active election events. Govorukhin yesterday explained their reasoning
"United Russia represents a minor part of society, while the People's Front covers the whole country," he said. Until recently, United Russia was referred to by everyone, including its chairman, Putin, as "the party of the public majority."
"Indeed, the word 'party' in most cases signifies not the whole, but only part of society," Andrei Vorobyov, Putin's financial representative, said while commenting on Govorukhin's statement. "But in our case, it is 2 million people. The size can be judged if we recall that there are 143 million people in Russia, nearly 65 million attended the parliamentary election and half of them voted for United Russia."
Kommersant wrote earlier that special technical headquarters will be responsible for the campaign's managerial issues. They are supervised by governors, presidential representatives and legislature speakers, most of whom are United Russia members.
By Irina Nagornykh
