Monday, August 13, 2018

Today’s ‘Inert’ Governors Could Become a Threat to Russia’s Territorial Integrity, Analysts Say


Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 13 – All but two of the heads of Russian federal subjects are members of the ruling United Russia Party and so would seem to be unlikely candidates to head any anti-Moscow frond. But Moscow analysts say their mishandling by the center and the interests of the West could transform them into a serious threat to the territorial integrity of Russia.

            In a Versiya commentary, Ruslan Gorevoy argues that the center has mishandled the governors apparently on the assumption that no matter what it does, they will fall into line. It has offered them more carrots than sticks and as a result, the governors in many cases are “biting the hand that feeds them” (versia.ru/esli-regiony-naduvat-oni-stanut-lopatsya-vzryvaya-rossiyu-iznutri).

            The center acts as if distributing good things is enough and that it does not need to punish those who violate its interests, the Versiya writer says. And it compounds that mistake by backing enormous construction projects as for Chechnya that other leaders ask for, sometimes getting and sometimes not.

            When these are handed out, Gorevoy continues, the regions use the money for themselves often with little thought of the interests of the country as a whole; and when they ask and aren’t given money, they become angry, pointedly asking why some regions who behave worse than they do are being subsidized while they aren’t.

            “In essence,” he says, “the government has put in train a mechanism of producing dissatisfaction where it did not exist. And this can turn out to be mortally dangerous at the level of a single state. Already a frond is being born, and this is happening from within the party of power, United Russia, not from anywhere else.

            Anatoly Nesmiyan, an opposition activist and commentator, tells Gorevoy that “today the governors are an inert mass.  But it is not difficult to activate them and transform them into an instrument for the destruction of the country.  I would not be surprised,” he adds, “if the American made this calculation and attempted to use them.”

            If the existing power vertical should begin to collapse, he continues, “only two organized forces would remain in the country, the regional elites and organized crime. And if the first came to dominate the second, the country would face with a high degree of probability disintegration” in short order.

            The Americans aren’t going to wait for this process to develop on its own, Nesmiyan argues. They will back the regional elites as giving them the best chance to destroy Russia. If these elites are already furious at the central government in Moscow, their job will be much easier.

            The upcoming gubernatorial elections in September and even those next year could yield a large number of anti-Moscow regional leaders if the central government does not find a way to address the pension age issue soon. Russians aren’t going to vote for a party that is stealing from them, the analyst says. 

            “Let us fantasize a little,” Gorevoy says. On September 10, there could be a large number of new governors who do not owe anything to the center. Their appearance would lead others to follow their lead, either because they resent sending tax money to Moscow or they are angry that they don’t get enough back.

            In that event, he argues, a sizeable fraction, possibly even a majority of the governors would be ready to oppose Moscow much as many of them did in the 1990s.  The Kremlin could dismiss some of them, but that might make the crisis of power even worse and lead to an explosion or exit from the system. 

In any case, it would be hard to imagine something worse – especially since the center will have only itself to blame for its mishandling of a situation the Americans will be only too pleased to exploit. 

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