In autumn, Moscow will elect a new city Parliament. However, the choice leads to protests, because of the 19 members of the opposition were not allowed in the first place. One of them, Dmitry Gudkov is. With DW, he spoke about the backgrounds.
DW: Mr. Gudkov, they were in 2016, the only Kremlin-critical, deputies in the Russian Parliament. Now you want to move in with their “party of change” to the Moscow city Parliament. You must not, however, as 18 other independent candidates also. What interferes with the election Commission to you?
Dmitry Gudkov: My Chance to win. So as with all the others. We already had half of the election campaign behind us. For a victory in an election district, I would vote as the candidate of 12,000. But I had already 7500 real Voters signatures. That would be 60 percent of the success. The Mosgorduma has 45 seats. We were 19 independent candidates that can win in the case of a United campaign would have. Take seven to eight candidates of the so-called system opposition and you get an oppositional majority.
From the point of view of the government authorities, therefore, a logical decision that has surprised you?
Exactly. Because that would have meant their loss of power. The Mosgorduma would become in this case a real democratic Parliament, or 2.6 trillion rubles (the equivalent of around 37 billion euros) are managed. This is a lot of money is being plundered in this town normally. The authorities got scared and wouldn’t let us on the brazen way for the election.
What’s so outrageous?
Outrageous is that a police handwriting expert tells you suddenly that 499 signatures are Fake. Fake. Or, if the database of your potential voters suddenly absurd error popping up: Name: male gender: female.
But that would be obvious manipulation, that no man can believe in it. If they actually happened, what was the calculus of the authorities?
The authorities live by a principle, which was proclaimed in this country already in the 1990s, years of age: The people, eats everything. They believed, therefore, that Moscow would swallow already.
You don’t want to swallow it but and organize protests. The decision not to allow the engine to more than 10,000 people on the street. What you want to achieve?
We do everything we can. First, on the legal process. We have a rich contradictions and complaints to commissions and courts. But people also go on the road. Put yourself in their position! Each of us candidates went personally with his helpers, through the districts and promoted to real voters signatures. The people saw us, and we knew: Ok, there’s a Gudkov. The is real and has a real Team. He is collecting signatures. We have supported him, our signature given. And all of a sudden: Boom! Nothing Gudkov says to these people, which is not at all on the list. Instead, a government emerges candidate, whom no one has seen before.
The exclusion of Dmitry Gudkov of the Moscow local election drove thousands of people out on the street
Do you think that your protests can actually change something?
We really want to achieve something. If you exclude us so rude of the election, we will fight for the abolition of this choice. Or for the resolution of the Mosgorduma. I’m not a Fan of the protests. I don’t like you at all. I’m tired of it. But I have no other choice.
The Situation is strange, as the popularity of the government party is currently at a low ebb. Even the party Chairman Dmitry Medvedev criticized the “United Russia”. Their candidates to conceal their party affiliation, let in the election campaign, any party symbolics. Plays you in the hands?
Of course. And for me it was easy to collect the signatures. I walked up to the man and said, are for us and against the “United Russia”. The people stopped and gave me their signature. On the other hand, but the principle applies, unfortunately, the lower the poll numbers of the party in government, the more repressive the authorities. This means constant provocations against us. My poll workers were repeatedly robbed. One was beaten and suffered a concussion. The other came up with a blood lip ends thereof. The signed lists were ripped out of my Hand.
If you look at the overall Russian policy, you get the impression that there is an omnipotent President, Vladimir Putin, the Russians choose constantly, but not a real functioning Opposition. Why?
There is an Opposition in Russia. The people who fight with your investigative revelations against corruption: politicians and activists are…
…such as Alexei Navalny?
Among other things. Alexei Navalny, Ilya Yashin, Dmitry Gudkov… but There is also a second Opposition. These are simple citizens fighting against, for example, toxic waste incineration plants. Or journalists, who fight for the freedom of their colleague Ivan Golunow (the police arrested the other day, illegally because of alleged possession of drugs – Anm. d. Red.). These people are dissatisfied with the situation in the country.
A real civil society?
…in our country more and more powerful. We are experiencing a politicization of the society. The policy comes to each of us to go home. Look at the young people. Are indignant, because the authorities are always talking of the censorship of the Internet to introduce. In this case, these young people see on the other side of the political dinosaurs such as Alexander Bastrykin, the head of the Russian investigative Committee, looking with a magnifying glass on the Internet, or Vladimir Putin, who use a Smartphone and not between Transgender and Transformer may differ. These young people are a civil society that want the Old run. So, this is also Opposition in Russia. One day will change Oppositon one Opposition and two unite and our country.