Paul Goble
Staunton, December 6 – The Moscow media are making much of the fact that a new Levada Center poll shows that Russians are devoting ever less attention to the continuing protests in Khabarovsk, focusing instead on other issues (znak.com/2020-12-07/sociologiya_rossiyane_perestali_vspominat_protesty_v_habarovske).
But that trend ignores something else: people in Siberia not only are continuing to focus on the Khabarovsk protest but to stage demonstrations in support of those still going into the streets to protest Moscow’s removal of an elected and popular governor, an important indication of growing regional solidarity (club-rf.ru/detail/4745).
This weekend alone, regional news agencies report, there were demonstrations in support of Khabarovsk in Novosibirsk Oblast, the Altay Kray, and Irkutsk Oblast. Siberian commentator Aleksey Mazur says that “very many continue to follow the protests in Khabarovsk” and that demonstrations in support of those can grow into protests of their own.
But he and political scientist Sergey Shmidt says that in each case, local people are using the Khabarovsk situation in their own ways, advancing their own specific causes more than coming up with a pan-regional one. And that means they will grow or fade less because of what happens in Khabarovsk than how officials respond to their actions.
In some cases, regional observers add, governors aren’t concerned about these demonstrations as long as they are focused on problems elsewhere. Thus, they won’t act to suppress protests in support of Khabarovsk because Khabarovsk is somewhere else. That allows these protests to continue but perhaps not to link up.
Shmidt for his part says he doesn’t believe these actions will have an impact on the upcoming Duma elections. Instead, he suggests, something will happen somewhere other than in Khabarovsk and that will drive voters in Siberia in one direction or another. What that might be is at present impossible to say.
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