Comment & Analysis: The Kremlin`s new doublespeak: Putin will never give Russia the reforms he
promises
ByLine: NICK PATON WALSH IN MOSCOW
Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Russia's richest man, its last pretender to the presidential throne and now its most
controversial inmate, could be forgiven if, when hearing President Putin promise him an "open trial", he
allowed himself a tiny whoop for joy. A public bout between a politicised prosecutor and his internationalised defence
team could only accentuate the flawed and partial nature of the Russian judiciary upon which the Kremlin so depends.
Yet Mr Khodorkovsky, who this week was put on trial for tax evasion and fraud, should have held his breath. In
Putin's Russia, an "open trial" can exist in a courtroom barely big enough to fit in the defence's
lawyers, a handful of journalists and a gang of armed spetsnaz in fatigues.
The world will only see snatches of the trial. Indeed, one can scarce feel comfortable that the verdict will be
"open". In 2002, only 0.8% of defendants were acquitted. Such grave contradictions between what the president
says and what he does pervade daily life. It is as if the Kremlin - increasingly staffed by ex-KGB officers - believes
the population is endlessly tolerant of falsehood.
Mr Putin's doublespeak reaches a tour de force when he addresses Russia's poor - the 100 million plus who
barely have enough to feed and clothe themselves. At any given opportunity, the benevolent tsar promises further
improvements in living standards. He opened his uncontested campaign for re-election in February with a promise of
"a fundamental improvement in the quality of lives" of would-be voters.
His state-of-the-nation speech last month marvelled at how wages had risen 50% during his first term. He also pledged
that, "no one, nothing will stop Russia on its path to strengthen democracy and uphold democratic rights and
freedoms".
On the podium, he is a foreign investor's dream: a strong, sober president who insists on economic growth and
reform, while emphasising the plight of the ordinary man and his right to a better, freer life. Yet his deeds in the
first three months of his second term have shown him to be the very opposite of the liberal reformer.
Political freedoms remain under attack, despite all political forces or parties bar Putin loyalists having been
extinguished. Since the easy election victory of March 15, two key bills have been pushed through a parliament dominated
by the pro-Putin United Russia party. The first has limited the right to protest. The second has cut back on the
citizen's right to seek a referendum, in effect amending the constitution - something Mr Putin also promised not to
do.
While on the surface appearing to challenge the ills of privatisation - the "robber barons" of the 1990s
who, like Khodorkovsky, made personal fortunes by buying up the state's assets - Putin is more obsessed with
selling off state assets than his predecessor, Boris Yeltsin. The roads, the railways, the woods, the land - even the
lakes: all are now subject to reforms that will see their transfer to private ownership in the coming decades.
Under a law announced last month, the poorest Russians - including single mothers, pensioners, the disabled and war
veterans - will lose the free public transport, cheap medicine and food and other benefits they enjoyed during the
Soviet era, and instead be given a paltry cash sum in compensation. A new bill will ask these people to pay more for
their utility bills.
Economist Mikhail Delyagin has helpfully coined the term the "law enforcement oligarchy" - the new elite of
Kremlin enforcers who want to let private enterprise reign, provided the state gets its cut and calls the tune.
Indeed, the fate of Yukos -Mr Khodorkovsky's empire - is a lesson in point. On Thursday, Mr Putin said the huge
tax bills bearing down on Yukos were not aimed at sending it into bankruptcy. The market and Yukos's share price
soared, and the company devised a plan to sell off part of its shares, perhaps taking up an offer from Gazprom, the
part-private, part-state energy giant. Yesterday, however, Yukos's assets remained frozen and its troubles far from
over.
Whether on Thursday the Kremlin head again meant what he said or not, his comments had the desired effect of all his
rhetoric - they confirmed that Mr Putin is the only real big player in Russia's fledgling "free"
market.
Nick Paton Walsh is the Guardian's Moscow correspondent
nick.walsh@ guardian.co.uk
|
RUSSIA IN FACTS
