Статьи на ту же тему

События и комментарии экспертов фонда

  |  27 мая, 2013   |   Читать на сайте издания

Newbie Parties not Going for the Vote

Argumenty.ru publication

 

Only three and a half months remain until the Single Day Elections on 8th September. As expected, following the easing of legislation governing the registration of political parties, more of them are taking an active part in the run up to the elections and competition is being stepped up everywhere – both on a rural and municipal level. However, statistics show that these new parties are not rushing to take part in the elections themselves.

 

To date, the Russian Ministry of Justice has registered a total of 71 parties, 45 of which can be included on the electoral ballot. Moreover, as experts point out, many of the new parties have not been created to win a battle for power or participation in real politics, but rather as a PR exercise or as part of a political business deal  (parties which are ‘assigned’.) In other words, from the voters’ point of view they are of no use at all.

 

If one looks at how political parties are faring in the first half of this year then one can see a picture emerging, on a regional level, where so far only six parties have entered the electoral race. They are: ‘Civic Platform’, ‘Republican Party of Russia – PARNAS’, the Party of Social Security, ‘Communists of Russia’, People’s Party of Russia and the Green Alliance – People’s Party. A few more parties participated in the elections at a local level but in total, only 16 new parties revealed themselves. The remaining 25 that had a mandate to take part in the elections were simply token parties - not venturing to undertake any serious political work.

 

Experts provide several reasons for the weak showing of Russia’s new parties. Leonid Polyakov, a member of the Expert Council of the Foundation for Civil Society Development (FCSD) and head of the Department of General Political Science in Moscow’s Higher School of Economics recalls the similar experience of the 1990s when there were also many parties in existence not participating in the elections but simply serving to confuse the voters. ‘Quite often a party will come into being under a certain leader, a businessman; someone who is capable of buying that party “just in case” – as something to keep in reserve’ says Polyakov. ‘And then he can use it in a single-mandate electoral district or in the election of any post at a municipal level, or maybe even in the election of a mayor or governor. In some cases parties are created as spoilers – in other words they take part in the election process but are never meant to actually get into power. They exist only to take votes away from this or that competing party.’

 

Polyakov believes that at the present time only 20% of registered parties are actually politically active.

 

Vitalii Ivanov, head of the Department of Regional Research in the FCSD confirms fears that the majority of new parties are simply business enterprises. ‘One person creates a party simply in order to gratify his own vanity, another does so in order to sell the party franchise. There are cases where parties are registered only with a view to sell them on at a later stage. They take advantage of the electoral requirement for a pre-registered name, presuming that if someone is interested then they will buy it. We are hearing all sorts of different stories.’

 

‘At present 71 political parties are registered in Russia. This is a nonsense. On the one hand it sounds terrible and on the other it’s just laughable. We should not have all these parties. This is a case where increasing the number of parties in the political system destroys the system itself. What’s the point of having a party if any crook can go and register a party in his own name? Creating a party should be a serious political undertaking and if it is available to every Tom, Dick and Harry then it discredits the very essence of its existence.’

 

Representatives of Parliamentary political parties agree with the political experts. Viktor Kidyaev, the Deputy Secretary of the General Council of ‘United Russia’ says: ‘For many people the registration of a political party is simply evidence of entrepreneurial talent and not the desire to create a group of like-minded people to take part in elections and promote political programmes. Therefore it seems likely that on 8th September on the ballot paper, we will be seeing well known parties seeking election and not new ones because they are simply not interested in taking part in the electoral process.’