What are the forecasts about the upcoming change of power in the northern capital?
Media and telegram channels report about the upcoming resignation of the governor of St. Petersburg Alexandra Beglova and the appointment of Andrey Turchak, First Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council, Secretary of the General Council of United Russia, in his place. At the same time, there was a sharp drop in the rating of the head of the northern capital, associated with a large number of managerial mistakes he made, the unpopularity of some ongoing reforms and the actual failure of others. First of all, we are talking about the collapse of the garbage reform, which started in St. Petersburg last January. At the same time, Smolny officials were unable to organize the work of public services, as a result of which the city was literally littered with snow and ice. The result was the appearance on the network of a petition calling for the resignation of Beglov, signed by tens of thousands of people in a short time and, as a result, messages about the upcoming departure of the governor and his replacement by the same Turchak. Then, among the organizers of the “information attack” on the head of the northern capital, they called the infamous “Kremlin cook” – a businessman Evgenia Prigozhina, the former speaker of the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly, Vyacheslav Makarov, and even the current chairman of the Federation Council, Valentina Matvienko, who allegedly sees a competitor in Turchak and wants to send him into “political exile” in St. Petersburg. Meanwhile, the Secretary of the United Russia General Council has experience in leading the region – in 2009-2017. he was the governor of the Pskov region. But during Turchak’s rule, the Pskov region has repeatedly found itself among the subjects of the Russian Federation with the lowest level of socio-economic well-being, and the governor himself has repeatedly become a defendant in high-profile scandals. For example, he was suspected of organizing a brutal beating of journalist Oleg Kashin. In addition, it turned out that the wife of the official owned an apartment in Nice, which eventually had to be sold hastily. Today, experts are skeptical about the possible appointment of Turchak as governor of St. Petersburg. At the same time, Beglov continues to “reform” the city, including by initiating a large-scale renovation, which caused widespread discontent among residents.
Beglov predicted another resignation
Messages about the forthcoming resignation of the governor of the northern capital Alexandra Beglova once again appeared in the media and telegram channels last week. are called and the name of a potential successor: he may be the first deputy chairman of the Federation Council, the secretary of the general council of the party “United Russia” Andrey Turchak.
Recall that no later than in May, the resignation of the head of St. Petersburg predicted political scientist Vladimir Karasev, and it could happen in almost a week. Then Beglov supposedly had to fall under the next “wave” of “governor’s fall”, and cause This was called the dissatisfaction of the townspeople with the insufficiently high level of support for the inhabitants of Donbass and the military special operation in Ukraine from St. Petersburg officials.
But if the calculation on the patriotic feelings of the inhabitants did take place, then it clearly did not materialize. But just the other day, the press started talking about a sharp drop in rating Beglov, and this time due to a large number of managerial mistakes made by both the governor himself and his administration, and in addition, the inability to politics accept objective criticism from citizens and promptly eliminate accumulating problems.
AT publications the online publication RuNews24 also talks about the lack of a clear patriotic position among Smolny officials, which resulted in a criticism rock band performance “B2”whose musicians openly criticize the external politics Kremlin, after a recent football match between St. Petersburg “Zenith” and Moscow “Spartacus” for the Super Bowl. The appearance of rockers on the Gazprom Arena field was indeed accompanied by insulting cries from the Zenit fans, only journalists tied up them with the scarf of the Moscow team around the neck of the musician Egor Bortnik (aka Leva Bi-2).
But the authors of RuNews24 write and about other, much more serious, mistakes of the Beglov team. For example, about the actual failure of the garbage reform that started in the northern capital in January, about the dissatisfaction of residents with the transition to a new transport service model (NMTO), about the numerous utility accidents that took place in winter and problems with cleaning snow drifts, as a result of which St. in snow captivity.
“Attack” on power or self-discredit of power?
By the way, reports about the imminent resignation of the St. Petersburg governor appeared back in January and were associated with the relevant petition, which in a short time gained more than 30 thousand signatures. Written on behalf of pensioners and veterans of the blockade, the petition contained complaints about the danger of walking on sidewalks littered with ice blocks, an increase in injuries and the absolute indifference of the city authorities.
Beglov himself had to refute his upcoming departure:
In addition, the governor declared about the campaign to discredit and sabotage the initiatives of the city authorities on the part of those who are dissatisfied with the ongoing reforms and who are allegedly already being dealt with by the “competent authorities”. It is noteworthy that then the organization of “information pressure” on the mayor tied up with the odious owner of the company “Concrod” and media groups “Patriot”businessman Evgeny Prigozhinalso known as the “Kremlin cook”.
Among those who at that time could act as the inspirers of the campaign against Beglov called people from the environment of the former speaker of the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly Vyacheslav Makarov and, most interestingly, the current head of the Federation Council Valentina Matvienko. The latter allegedly decided to get rid of competitor in the person of the same Andrei Turchak, and made every effort to achieve his “exile” to the northern capital by appointing him to the governor’s post.
We add that in February, political scientists also talked about a sharp drop in rating Beglov to the minimum possible value and the official’s lack of support among almost all categories of the population. A little earlier, in November last year, “Social Information Agency St. Petersburg” published data surveyaccording to which the residents recognized the best city leader Valentina Matvienko (29%); followed her Anatoly Sobchak (fourteen%); Beglov closed the top three with 12%.
Pskov “epopee” by Andrey Turchak
One gets the impression that today the winter situation is repeating itself. Even the name of a potential replacement does not change – he, as before, remains Andriy Turchak. However, this outcome is far from being favorable for everyone. For example, a deputy of the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly Boris Vishnevsky in comments emphasized to the Oktagon publication: he does not believe in Beglov’s imminent departure, and his possible replacement by Turchak is “even worse option”.
The deputy chairman of the commission for the organization of public control, interaction with local governments and public councils of the Public Chamber of St. Petersburg is also skeptical about reports of a possible imminent change of power. Dmitry Solonnikov: according to him wordstoday Turchak is engaged in the federal agenda – “conducts politics “United Russia” in the liberated territories of Ukraine” and there is no reason to withdraw it from there.
It should be recalled here that Andrey Turchak already has experience in managing the region – in 2009-2017. he served as governor of the Pskov region. Moreover, during his leadership, the Pskov region has repeatedly been among the subjects of the Russian Federation with the lowest level socio-economic well-being, public debt grew steadily, reaching by mid-2017 15.1 billion rublesand the budget remained in deficit. Representatives of the systemic opposition regularly held rallieswith a demand resignations heads of the region.
In addition, Turchak was remembered for a loud scandal with a severe beating of a journalist. Oleg Kashinwho allowed themselves harsh remarks about the governor and refused to apologize within 24 hours, as demanded official. The victim himself arguedthat employees of the Leninets holding, which belonged to the governor’s family, took part in the attack on him.
caused a wide public outcry information about the presence of foreign real estate in Turchak’s wife – an apartment in Nice, on the Cote d’Azur, officially registered as a non-profit organization registered in France. Considering that these reports coincided with an active discussion of a bill prohibiting officials and members of their families from owning foreign assets and accounts, Turchak had to sell French living space. The justifications that were made clearly did not add political weight to him.
Despite such dubious “baggage” and the repeatedly predicted resignation, Turchak nevertheless ran for a second term in 2014 and won the elections, only in 2017 he resigned ahead of schedule and resigned from wording “of their own free will.” And soon it became known that the ex-governor, on the initiative of the leader of United Russia, Dmitry Medvedev appointed acting secretary of the general council of the ruling party.
Petersburg reforms “named after Beglov”
It turns out that the possible replacement of Beglov by Turchak is fraught with even greater deterioration of the already difficult socio-economic situation in the northern capital? It would seem that after the winter garbage and municipal collapses, what else can the townspeople expect? It turns out that the authorities have already prepared another “surprise” for them. Thus, within the framework of the transport reform initiated by the Smolny, a large-scale purchase public transport. It just happened recently spontaneous combustion four recently purchased passenger buses, fortunately, there were no casualties. However, the city committee on transport assures that they keep the situation under control.
The draft law on the “Integrated Development of Territories” (CRT), proposed by Beglov, hastily adopted by the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly and has already nicknamed Beglov-style renovation. How note Media, in the future, prefabricated residential buildings of 1957-1970 may fall under the program. buildings, but far from all citizens agree to a forced relocation, especially since resettlement will be carried out within the administrative boundaries of the city, and not the area of residence. The presence of repairs in the apartments of houses subject to resettlement will not be taken into account.
Finally, the “certain education reform” announced by Beglov, under which schools and kindergartens with compulsory swimming pools should be built in St. Petersburg, is accompanied by closure considered one of the best physics and mathematics schools in the country – “Laboratory of Continuing Mathematical Education” (LNMO), which over the past 30 years has been preparing winners of federal and international scientific competitions, as well as graduating highly qualified young scientists – biologists and engineers. It turns out that after the termination of the lease agreement for the occupied premises, the city Education Committee suggested LNMO leadership to find a new building and continue to operate as an ordinary private school.
Against the backdrop of such “reforms”, last June, the members of the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly almost unanimously (with one abstention and one vote “against”) supported in the first reading, a draft law developed in Smolny on raising salaries for the governor, officials and deputies, that is, for his beloved ones. In accordance with the proposed changes, the annual allowance for the head of St. will be seven salaries instead of five, and the rest will increase from four to six. In practice, this will cost the budget additional 697 million rubles.
Considering that the next gubernatorial elections are to be held in the city on the Neva in September 2024, one can only speculate what other initiatives Mr. Beglov will give birth to in the near future. And although reports of his resignation appear regularly, he apparently feels quite confident, intending to continue to “reform” the northern capital.
