#9 - JRL 2006-272 - JRL Home
Moscow Times
December 4, 2006
United Russia Touts Platform
By Nabi Abdullaev
Staff Writer

Conservatives the world over favor small government. Social Democrats subscribe to the welfare state. And now there are the true believers of United Russia, who say they will fight for ordinary people, boost the economy and combat corruption.

That, at least, was the platform mapped out by party leaders at United Russia's seventh congress this past weekend in Yekaterinburg. The platform follows five years of criticism that the pro-Kremlin party does not believe in anything.

"Every step enshrined in United Russia's strategy aims to increase the number of active people in our country," party leader and State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov said Saturday at the congress.

The congress was not only designed to launch United Russia's platform. It also kicked off a yearlong campaign for the Duma in late 2007.

"We need to confirm United Russia's leadership, to win by a meaningful margin," Gryzlov said, vowing to continue on the course laid out by President Vladimir Putin.

More than 500 delegates and 2,500 guests descended on the industrial Urals city for the meeting. Representatives from 19 foreign political parties, including Communists from China and Republicans from the United States, also turned up, a statement issued by United Russia said.

Meanwhile, about 2,000 protesters sought unsuccessfully to rally outside the Kosmos complex where the congress was being held. Police quickly dispersed the crowd.

Following the failed protest, as many as 70 liberal and Communist activists blocked the main thoroughfare in and out of Yekaterinburg for several hours.

Inside the complex, Sergei Sobyanin, head of the presidential administration, read a greeting from the president, who called United Russia "the most influential political force in the country."

United Russia enjoys majority status in 65 of 89 regional parliaments and a constitutional majority in the State Duma. And 69 region heads belong to the party, Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu boasted at the congress.

The party got another shot in the arm at the congress, where Sergei Chemezov, head of the Rosoboronexport state arms trader, was elected to United Russia's Supreme Council.

Another Putin ally, Vladimir Yakunin, head of Russian Railways, was expected to get elected to the panel but did not.

Widely view as a rubber stamp for Putin, United Russia came under fire after backing a measure last year cutting social benefits, and a series of bills this year that effectively make it harder for other parties to compete in upcoming elections.

Shoigu, speaking at the congress, proposed that in the future the party hold internal referendums on sensitive issues.

He also called for elections for the parliament's upper chamber, the Federation Council. Federation Council members are now appointed by regional legislatures and governors.

Gryzlov promised to take action on this in the lower chamber, and he lashed out at the party's political rivals, accusing unnamed opponents of "undermining" Putin's agenda.

Singled out for attack was Anatoly Chubais, head of Unified Energy Systems. Gryzlov accused Chubais of pursuing profit ahead of the country's decaying power plants and grids. Chubais, whose name is associated with the chaotic and unfair privatization of state assets in the 1990s, has morphed into a punching bag for populist critics.