By Attacking Navalny, Yavlinsky Confirms Him as Opposition Leader of the Future, Gallyamov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, February 8 – Grigory Yavlinsky’s diatribe against Aleksey Navalny is “yet another confirmation” that Navalny’s position as leader of the opposition is solidifying, something Yavlinsky, an opposition leader from the 1990s, cannot bear but that is only good news for Navalny, Abbas Gallyamov says.

            For Russian voters, who attacks someone is often as important or even more so than who supports him or her, the former Putin speechwriter and current Moscow commentator says. Being attacked by someone so obviously part of the past is thus good news for someone who wants to lead the future (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=6021712F10D83).

            That is because “in this battle, the past is of course condemned to lose.” And in this regard, Gallyamov continues, the Kremlin is even less well-positioned that the aging opposition figures of the 1990s. It simply doesn’t have anyone it can put forward who is credible as a young leader of the future.

            The Russian “voter understands the artificiality” of all those Putin pushes forward “and does not give any significance to their activity. The voter intuitively understands that a real politician is someone who is prepared to take risks for his convictions. Those who praise Putin on television aren’t politicians. They are careerists.”

            Navalny who has shown himself willing to take risks for what he believes has a credibility with voters that will stand him in good stead, Gallyamov suggests. Being attacked by someone who hasn’t taken risks, at least not in recent decades, will only boost his chances in that regard.