Let’s start with, perhaps, the most interesting figure, the head of the representative office of the Murmansk region, Ashot Bablumyan. His biography, as well as his role in the government of the 51st region, is very unusual. IN official version it is indicated that the official was born in 1971. Graduated from Yerevan State University with a degree in Oriental Languages and Literature. He worked in the Administration of the President of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism), the Office of the Government of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism), the Ministry of Regional Development of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism), as chairman of the supervisory board of the state autonomous non-profit organization Regional Development Agency, as well as senior managing director of the state LLC Management Company Rusnano.
Bablumyan got the position of head of the representative office of the Murmansk region, despite the multimillion-dollar loan debt in front of one of the banks where the statesman worked advisor to the president from 2011 to 2014.
The media noted and the fact that Bablumyan is allegedly engaged in censorship, telling Murmansk media which politicians to mention and which not. If this is true, this is not the first time for him: in 1999, Bablumyan headed the information policy of the ORT television channel, when it was owned by an entrepreneur Boris Berezovsky. And in the early 2000s, Bablumyan joined the management of the then St. Petersburg Channel 5. These were the days of the governor Vladimir Yakovlev. Apparently, Bablumyan’s work pleased him so much that he made the media manager his adviser to the post of presidential envoy in the Southern Federal District, and then took him with him to Moscow when he became Minister of Regional Development.
In 2018, Bablumyan became chairman of the board of directors of Samara JSC AKB Gazbank, but literally a few months later his license was revoked. Now the institution is still trying through the court to force Bablumyan to repay the loan.
Despite all this, Bablumyan not only heads the Moscow representative office of the Murmansk region, but also interferes in regional politics. Journalists even nicknamed him the shadow vice-governor, and the Murmansk Council of Deputies directly accused him of coordination of “counterproductive activities”within the framework of which Bablumyan deals with “issues of internal and information policy in the Government of the Murmansk region, puts pressure on deputies.”
The Chronicles wrotethat regions are abusing the right to conclude government contracts without bidding. Among the leaders is the Murmansk region. After Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism)’s invasion of Ukraine, such abuses increased even more. Bablumyan sits on the presidium of the commission, which decides who to give this or that government contract without a competition.
Thus, the representative office of the Arkhangelsk region is headed by the daughter of the former deputy director of the department of the Accounts Chamber of Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) Aslan Atabiev, 34-year-old Nazilya Naumova. Immediately after graduation, she got a job in the secretariat of Deputy Minister of Economic Development Alexander Tsybulsky. When he was appointed head of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug, he took Atabieva with him. When the official was given the Arkhangelsk region to feed, Nazila, who got married and changed her surname, again followed him, heading the representative office of the Arkhangelsk region.
The head of Komi also gave his long-time comrade-in-arms a job Vladimir Uiba. Before joining the republic, Uyba headed the Federal Medical and Biological Agency. The current head of the Komi representative office in Moscow, Sergei Mamonov, at that time worked as the director of the Federal Center for Information Technologies for Extreme Problems subordinate to the agency.
The governor of the Novgorod region also brought his people Andrey Nikitin. Before his appointment as head of the region, he headed the government’s Agency for Strategic Initiatives (ASI). Its official address is the Book House on Novy Arbat, where the representative office of the 53rd region is located.
People from ASI include the vice-governor of the Novgorod region, who oversees the Moscow representative office of the region, Alexei Prudnikov, as well as the head of the representative office, 27-year-old Adam Gruver. It is known about him that in 2017-2018 he was member of one of the precinct election commissions in Moscow from the party of a political strategist Andrey Bogdanov “Civil position”. It is known only for the fact that when in 2018 the “Progress Party” Alexei Navalny was preparing for the founding congress in order to register with the Ministry of Justice, “Civil Position” suddenly renamed itself the “Progress Party”depriving Navalny and his supporters of the right to use this name.
The representative office of the Kaliningrad region in Moscow has recently been headed by 35-year-old Artem Papeta. He is closely associated with the famous political strategist Denis Ogai. The latter moved to the 39th region several years ago and became a deputy from United Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) in the city of Baltiysk. Both Ogai and Papeta were born in the Tula region. Since 2013, they have been doing business together: first they created the OK-Promo company in Tula, and then the company of the same name in Moscow. Companies organized concerts throughout the country. Ogai is still doing this, simultaneously with his work as a deputy and as a political strategist. Artem Papeta even managed to take part in Ogai’s political technology activities. So, journalists wrotethat in 2019 Ogai campaigned for a pro-government candidate in the Moscow City Duma elections. In the same district, Artem Papeta was nominated as a dummy (technical) candidate, who, as befits such a candidate, took the last place. And in the elections in Baltiysk Ogai indicatedwhich works in the autonomous non-profit organization “My District” – in fact, the election headquarters of the Moscow mayor’s office.
Papeta’s predecessor at the head of the Kaliningrad representative office in Moscow was Denis Saliy. He is a professional in this matter. Born in Krasnodar, he has worked for the last six years in the Kaliningrad authorities, heading the region’s representative offices in St. Petersburg and Moscow. Journalists even called the official one of the highest paid government employees.
In 2013, Saliy suddenly changed the Kaliningrad region to the Ryazan region, also heading the representative office in Moscow. To journalists he then said, that “no comments will be given on this matter or on any others.” But two months later, Saliy changed the region again: now he heads the representative office of the Pskov region in Moscow, but already with the rank of first deputy governor of the region. This is the very case when you want to remain in the civil service and at the same time work in a dust-free position in Moscow.
It is also necessary to mention the representative of the Republic of Karelia in Moscow, Vladimir Timofeev. For many years, he built a political career in his native Chuvashia, where he managed to work both as a republican deputy and as the head of the Administration of the Head of the Republic Nikolai Fedorov. With the latter, he then moved to Moscow and worked in the Ministry of Agriculture, which was headed by Fedorov. In 2017, Timofeev moved to Karelia, where the new apartment governor Arthur Parfenchikov appointed him as his deputy and head of the region’s representative office in the capital. After this, journalists called Timofeev is the richest official in the 10th region. Timofeev is busy with important matters: praises Karelia in Beijing, improves relations with Portugal, opens fish festivals in Moscow. Timofeev owns not only several apartments, but also a house in Cyprus. And the daughter of the “patriot” graduated from a Swiss school and remained to live in this “unfriendly country.”
After the already mentioned Nazila Naumova, the representative office of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug in Moscow was headed by Muscovite Ilya Stakhov. He came to the Nenets Autonomous Okrug several years ago and worked as an adviser to the previous governor Tsybulsky. At the same time he headed the public organization “Boxing Federation of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug”. “Chronicles” know that 20 years ago, Stakhov’s namesake came to the attention of the police in a theft case in the Moscow district of Yuzhnoye Butovo. How that case ended is unknown. But it is known that ten years ago the Moscow the court recognized Stakhov’s full namesake is guilty of drunken driving.
Some are in the mansion and some are on the highway
Of course, all these people must sit somewhere. And here everything is different for everyone. For example, the authorities of St. Petersburg did not skimp and purchased a house on Spiridonovka Street for the representative office. Blok lived on this street for a short time, the apartments of Marshal Zhukov and the writer Gorky were located here, and here stands the neo-Gothic Reception House of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, painted by Vrubel. Now, the “defender of family values,” the governor of St. Petersburg, Alexander Beglov, comes to this street every now and then.
And here is the Vologda region. Its population is declining; the median per capita income of residents in 2021 was slightly more than 25.5 thousand rubles. But the regional representative office in Moscow is located in the Begichev House on Starokonyushenny Lane. Griboyedov, Denis Davydov, Kuchelbecker, Levitan, Bunin, Chekhov visited here, and more than a century later a former mechanic, governor of the 35th region, comes here Oleg Kuvshinnikov. True, he resigned in the fall of 2023, and who will now visit the Begichev House will officially become clear after the elections in the fall of 2024.
Or the Leningrad region. According to Rosstat, as of January 1, 2023, in the 47th region, 39% of the street water supply network and 47% of the street sewer network needed to be replaced. The population here is also steadily declining, the median per capita cash income is at most 30 thousand rubles. But the regional representative office was located on Goncharnaya Street, occupying part of the Klapovskaya estate.
Other regions chose simpler addresses. Thus, representative offices of a number of regions (Arkhangelsk and Novgorod regions, Nenets Autonomous Okrug) are located in the Book House on Novy Arbat. The representative office of the Pskov region is located in the complex of buildings of the Presidential Administration in Nikolsky Lane: not the “castle” of Vice-Governor Alexander Seravin, but also nothing. Since 2003, the representative office of the Kaliningrad region has settled on Krasnaya Presnya Street. The authorities of the Murmansk region rent premises on Bolshaya Nikitskaya Street from OJSC Prodmontazh, owned by entrepreneur Ali Dukhaev. The Komi representative office is not located in the center of the capital, but on the Volokolamsk highway, occupying huge areas.
As you can see, people who consider themselves to be the authorities in Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) have somewhere to place their people in order to pursue their personal interests. But the voter will have to wait somehow.
If you want to learn more about the strange government agencies that oversee the Northwestern Federal District, read the Chronicle’s text about the office of the presidential plenipotentiary.
