Chuvash City Residents Vote Down Plans for Statue of Ivan the Terrible

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 14 – Residents of Alatyr in Chuvashia have voted down plans to erect a statue of Ivan the Terrible who conquered that region in the middle of the 16^th century. The vote was close, 1272 against as compared to 1096 for, but significant because almost 90 percent of the city’s 40,000 residents are ethnic Russians rather than Chuvash.

            The city administration, reflecting the Russian nationalist attitudes of many in Moscow, had pressed for the erection of such a statue, especially after the Council of Elders of the Chuvash National Congress succeeded in blocking a statue to Ivan in Cheboksary, the republic capital (turantoday.com/2019/05/ivan-the-terrible-monument.html).

            The Alatyr authorities agreed to a referendum, one they have now lost. Consequently, there will not be a statue of Ivan there to join the one that was erected to the tsar in Orel in 2016 and that another that some Russian activists have been pressing for in Kazan, which Ivan sacked in 1552 (turantoday.com/2016/10/tatar-milli-mejlis-monument-ivan-terrible-russia-kazan.html).