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Life After Judgment Day
As Fear of Clashes Between Authorities and Protesters Grows, the Opposition Remains Confident
Dan Peleschuk - Russia Profile - russiaprofile.org - 3.1.12 - JRL 2012-37

As Russia prepares for Sunday's presidential elections, one thing is at the top of many people's minds: what will the opposition do? As organizers continue to struggle unsuccessfully with Moscow city officials to get a protest sanctioned the day after the vote, scores of people have voiced their readiness through recent media and social network polls to take to the streets without official permission, stirring fears of government repression that may start shortly after the election. File Photo of Russian ProtestAfter weeks of ongoing anti-government rallies, the nascent opposition movement faces by far its biggest obstacle to date, but one on which it has set its sights all along. As much of the country quietly anticipates Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's reelection to the presidency, the opposition is meanwhile busy planning its post-election strategy. The latest news came when leaders announced they plan to hold a rally of up to 10,000 people on March 5, the day after the presidential vote.

But if the authorities had been somewhat cooperative before, things seem to be changing. Moscow city officials denied protest organizers permission to demonstrate in a number of public areas in central Moscow, including Lubyanka Square (in front of the FSB headquarters), and Manezh Square (just outside the Kremlin). According to Sergei Udaltsov, the leader of the Left Front movement and a key protest organizer, the authorities are offering Bolotnaya Square and Sakharov Avenue ­ the sight of the first two major protests ­ as alternatives, a proposal he claims doesn't gel with most demonstrators.

In fact, separate polls have confirmed as much. A February 29 survey on radio station Echo of Moscow's Web site found that out of nearly 1,000 people, about 84 percent said they would head to the city center to demonstrate on March 5 regardless of official approval. Similarly, a recent Facebook poll shows that around 70 percent of those surveyed will head to Lubyanka Square, even if a protest on Bolotnaya, further away from the Kremlin, is the only sanctioned action.

And as the tension grows during the remaining days before the presidential poll, Udaltsov noted that the matter is largely up to the government itself. "If protesting is prohibited, then we won't be able to completely control people," he told Russia Profile. "They won't listen to anyone ­ they'll go where they feel is necessary." Anti-corruption blogger and opposition darling Alexei Navalny has himself called protesters to Lubyanka Square, according to The Moscow Times, and also told PBS "Newshour" on February 29 that the opposition will altogether refuse to recognize Putin's victory should he win the presidency.

Others seem more worried. Writing for Echo of Moscow, popular crime novelist Boris Akunin, one of the movement's more recognizable faces, said he is concerned more about the post-election protests than about the elections themselves. "Can you lawfully and peacefully, under the guard of the riot police, shout slogans for freedom when a kilometer away those same riot police are throwing your friends into paddy wagons?" he wrote on February 29.

The dilemma arrives in the midst of Putin warning his opponents not to stage unsanctioned rallies. "The opinion of the minority should be respected, but the choice of the majority should be obeyed," RIA Novosti quoted him as saying at a recent press conference. "[T]he minority has no right to impose its will on the majority." Yet in perhaps darker terms, he also accused the opposition of plotting provocations in which a "sacrificial victim" would be killed, and the murder then pinned on the authorities. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, meanwhile, told Komsomolskaya Pravda the city would not allow a "tent city" akin to Ukraine's 2004 "Orange Revolution" ­ a nod to the RosAgit project's unsuccessful attempt to hand out free tents to aspiring protesters on February 29. Police broke up the action and arrested the group's co-founder, Vadim Korovin, before he could pass out the tents.

Given the protesters' willingness to come out in force and the authorities' reluctance to accommodate them, the possibility for violence and provocation seems disturbingly real. Yet opposition leaders remain confident in their followers' respect for decency and say they're hoping for the best come March 5. "Of course, we carry responsibility for everyone who comes out and as long as there are no provocations on their part, then everything will be normal and peaceful just like our previous protests," opposition leader and Just Russia parliamentarian Ilya Ponomaryov told Russia Profile. "We already have a history of this ­ you can see that there have never been any excesses. But if the authorities behave illegally, then of course people will resist."

Keywords: Russia, Protests, Politics - Russia News - Russia

 

As Russia prepares for Sunday's presidential elections, one thing is at the top of many people's minds: what will the opposition do? As organizers continue to struggle unsuccessfully with Moscow city officials to get a protest sanctioned the day after the vote, scores of people have voiced their readiness through recent media and social network polls to take to the streets without official permission, stirring fears of government repression that may start shortly after the election.

File Photo of Russian ProtestAfter weeks of ongoing anti-government rallies, the nascent opposition movement faces by far its biggest obstacle to date, but one on which it has set its sights all along. As much of the country quietly anticipates Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's reelection to the presidency, the opposition is meanwhile busy planning its post-election strategy. The latest news came when leaders announced they plan to hold a rally of up to 10,000 people on March 5, the day after the presidential vote.

But if the authorities had been somewhat cooperative before, things seem to be changing. Moscow city officials denied protest organizers permission to demonstrate in a number of public areas in central Moscow, including Lubyanka Square (in front of the FSB headquarters), and Manezh Square (just outside the Kremlin). According to Sergei Udaltsov, the leader of the Left Front movement and a key protest organizer, the authorities are offering Bolotnaya Square and Sakharov Avenue ­ the sight of the first two major protests ­ as alternatives, a proposal he claims doesn't gel with most demonstrators.

In fact, separate polls have confirmed as much. A February 29 survey on radio station Echo of Moscow's Web site found that out of nearly 1,000 people, about 84 percent said they would head to the city center to demonstrate on March 5 regardless of official approval. Similarly, a recent Facebook poll shows that around 70 percent of those surveyed will head to Lubyanka Square, even if a protest on Bolotnaya, further away from the Kremlin, is the only sanctioned action.

And as the tension grows during the remaining days before the presidential poll, Udaltsov noted that the matter is largely up to the government itself. "If protesting is prohibited, then we won't be able to completely control people," he told Russia Profile. "They won't listen to anyone ­ they'll go where they feel is necessary." Anti-corruption blogger and opposition darling Alexei Navalny has himself called protesters to Lubyanka Square, according to The Moscow Times, and also told PBS "Newshour" on February 29 that the opposition will altogether refuse to recognize Putin's victory should he win the presidency.

Others seem more worried. Writing for Echo of Moscow, popular crime novelist Boris Akunin, one of the movement's more recognizable faces, said he is concerned more about the post-election protests than about the elections themselves. "Can you lawfully and peacefully, under the guard of the riot police, shout slogans for freedom when a kilometer away those same riot police are throwing your friends into paddy wagons?" he wrote on February 29.

The dilemma arrives in the midst of Putin warning his opponents not to stage unsanctioned rallies. "The opinion of the minority should be respected, but the choice of the majority should be obeyed," RIA Novosti quoted him as saying at a recent press conference. "[T]he minority has no right to impose its will on the majority." Yet in perhaps darker terms, he also accused the opposition of plotting provocations in which a "sacrificial victim" would be killed, and the murder then pinned on the authorities. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, meanwhile, told Komsomolskaya Pravda the city would not allow a "tent city" akin to Ukraine's 2004 "Orange Revolution" ­ a nod to the RosAgit project's unsuccessful attempt to hand out free tents to aspiring protesters on February 29. Police broke up the action and arrested the group's co-founder, Vadim Korovin, before he could pass out the tents.

Given the protesters' willingness to come out in force and the authorities' reluctance to accommodate them, the possibility for violence and provocation seems disturbingly real. Yet opposition leaders remain confident in their followers' respect for decency and say they're hoping for the best come March 5. "Of course, we carry responsibility for everyone who comes out and as long as there are no provocations on their part, then everything will be normal and peaceful just like our previous protests," opposition leader and Just Russia parliamentarian Ilya Ponomaryov told Russia Profile. "We already have a history of this ­ you can see that there have never been any excesses. But if the authorities behave illegally, then of course people will resist."