Alexei Navalny on the program “Dura Lex” on Echo of Moscow (a Russian radio station)

Do you know what pluralism is? It means,

pluralism.

So, on this show on Saturday.

We'll take a look now.

On Saturday mine aired, and I recorded it on

Saturday. I recorded it, and released it on Saturday

with Naryshkin.

Uh-huh.

Less than a week has passed, and I'm recording

Navalny. This is what normal

media freedom looks like, right,

which, unfortunately, exists only

in Moscow among the major media outlets. No,

Remchukov's Nezavisimaya Gazeta.

I mean among the big media outlets. After all,

Echo of Moscow is a major media outlet, with an audience of a million

people, and the only thing comparable to Echo is

television.

Vedomosti. Vedomosti. Well, yes, no, I—I

understand your logic, that, well,

yes, that's true, but NTV really goes wild

to the fullest.

NTV records me from time to time. Yes,

yes, NTV really goes wild to the fullest.

All right, maybe Channel One will start acting up

a little too.

It's not far off, not far off.

We'll see, we'll see. Although

to be fair, it should be said that

Gordon called me recently and invited me onto

his program. I just couldn't come,

because I was away on a business trip. Well,

there you go, an example. So we have 23 minutes, 26

minutes.

All right.

Good evening. On the air is the program RLKS and

its host, Mikhail Barshchevsky. Today my guest is

Alexei Navalny, a lawyer and

blogger, the creator of the website Rospil.info.

Good evening.

Good evening. First of all,

a few words to our radio listeners. When

our first broadcast with Alexei took place,

many listeners and commentators

viewed our dialogue in terms of

who beat whom: Navalny beat Barshchevsky

or Barshchevsky beat Navalny. So,

dear friends, of course you may

read and hear whatever you want, but

neither Alexei nor I had, or have,

any goal of taking each other down. The goal is

for two lawyers, who in many ways stand

at polar opposite points

of view, to discuss professionally those

problems that, in our view,

are important issues for our

society. You may choose whose point

of view is closer to you, whose approach you prefer,

but we are not gladiators, and you are not spectators at

a ring. Please proceed from that.

At the very least, don't spoil

the relationship between Alexei and me. We treat each

other quite kindly.

Absolutely true.

Alexei, the topic of our program is

corruption.

Now, specific examples don't interest me,

because if you start giving them

to me, and I start giving them to you, then it will

just become a list of facts. They are

outrageous, that's obvious. But I want

to talk about the broader issues.

At the same time, in my view, the solution to the problem

lies precisely there, generally speaking, because until

we understand what the causes are, the systemic

causes, we won't defeat the system. We will

only be defeating individual specific cases.

So my question to you is this:

what are the causes of Russian corruption?

The deep, real causes of Russian

corruption? I believe that the deep

real causes of Russian corruption

lie in the fact that the country's political

system is, to a large extent,

based on corruption as a method

of governance. It is simply a way

of ensuring loyalty, a way

of delegating economic powers.

You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. I give you the opportunity

to be a corrupt governor. You

delegate power to me,

which allows me to be some kind of

mega-corrupt prime minister,

president, and so on. It's simply

this kind of social

relationship. Alexei, I think that

you are right in terms of stating

the existing fact, but that does not

answer the question of causes—how this

arose and why it arose.

Why did a corrupt

governor appear, someone you can bribe, and

why did a business sector appear that goes to

the governor and pays?

After all, that's not how it works in every country in the world, and

governors—I am talking about exactly that.

It is a system of economic and

political relationships. That's how

they are structured. Look,

one last thing. Of course,

I understand that you, uh, want to talk

perhaps about more general matters, avoiding

specific examples, but in any case

there will still be time for specific examples.

But there are certain facts that

show this. For example, quite

recently the governor of the, uh,

Far Eastern region, Darkin, was removed, and everyone

says that

he resigned for health reasons.

Oh, splendid—he resigned for

health reasons, as a certain

legend has it, though everyone understands perfectly well.

And now you'll tell me what exactly

ruined his health with, I take it.

I—I won't even go into that, yes. I'll

just note a few facts, so that

he was removed, and after that Putin's approval rating

rose sharply in Primorsky Krai.

The next governor said that

he would eradicate the corrupt

legacy of his predecessor, and so on. But

the question is: why, after all, did Darkin

leave for health reasons rather than being

removed over corruption? An investigation is underway against him.

And that is precisely

the answer to your question. It is this kind of system

of relationships, in which there is—and everyone

understands this—the foundation of the political

system is corruption, and there is also a class

of untouchables. Why is it that we achieve nothing

in fighting it?

Then a second question. I’ll give

my own point of view later, but only after

you answer the second question. So what, then,

is the cause of corruption in China?

It is comparable to Russia’s.

It is comparable to Russia’s. Uh,

its causes also lie in certain

patterns, in traditions, in ways

of social relations, but we can see that

China is trying to eradicate it with

mixed success—sometimes declaratively,

sometimes in practice—but there, at least,

there have been substantial steps. At least,

the fight against corruption is being waged there,

perhaps partly as a campaign, but as

a campaign it is undoubtedly being carried out there; they

execute the heads of state-owned companies

and so on.

Alexei, I’m asking about the causes, and you’re telling me about

what they are doing now. Do you understand the difference

in the question?

It was not by chance that I compared Russia and

China.

For better or worse, Russia is still, well, not

a totalitarian state. But China, under

a single monopolistic party, can be considered

a totalitarian state.

All right. If you want a very general

and fundamental answer from me,

then my answer is that, to prevent the emergence of corruption

and to eliminate it,

two basic things are needed. This is

simply classic. They are political

competition and freedom of the mass

media. Neither one nor the other exists either in

Russia or

China. Thank you for the quote.

That’s a bit Captain Obvious.

Well, yes, I can’t really argue with you here,

because I’ve been saying this phrase

for about ten years already. So now

listen to my answer, and I’m curious

whether you’ll be able to object. I do not

claim to possess the ultimate truth.

So, uh, the point is that corruption,

for example, in the United States 100 years ago was just as

bad as it is in Russia today.

I really like the example that the corrupt

budget of New York customs was equal

to the budget of New York State. And roughly

a similar level of corruption existed in Europe at the

end of the 10th century.

And the reasons are as follows.

Why is corruption so pervasive today both here and in China?

You named one reason, and I think

correctly: it is the system of governance.

And I’ll name the second one in a moment. Now,

as for the system of governance: there was a planned

economy.

Both here and in China, the planned economy

was abolished, collapsed,

but the institutions of a democratic society,

of market institutions, did not emerge. They cannot

appear overnight. And corruption

becomes a system of governance,

because these are clear, understandable rules

of the game. They replace the planned economy,

in a sense, and

with that, you explain the corruption of the

1990s, which did exist. And

indeed, there was probably even more of it

than there is now. But why doesn’t it

begin to decline gradually as institutions

take shape?

Agreed, agreed. Agreed.

That’s a fair point. And the second

reason: historically, both in Russia and in

China, over centuries—not decades, but

centuries—the elite and ruling class were not

property owners, not landowners, not

latifundists, not

industrialists, but officials. This is

a historical tradition. As long as

power remains in the hands of officials, and they can give or withhold

permission from a businessman, then

there will be corruption. But when

the situation changes, as it has today in

America and the West, when officials—when

businesspeople collectively can remove any

official,

well, you know, the European Union, for example, is criticized by everyone;

they say it is some kind of

bureaucratic state, a bureaucratic

kingdom, a paradise for officials. Nevertheless,

corruption does not exist there. I mean,

well, it is lower there—yes, I agree with you, I agree with you

that, naturally, there was a breakdown

of social relations; there was a planned

economy, then everything collapsed, new

market relations emerged, and people

who could simply, so to speak,

“get things done”—in that situation both

officials and businesspeople solved their

problems, because they had to be solved

by any means, corrupt or non-corrupt.

That explains why

indeed, from nineteen ninety to

nineteen ninety-nine

—and 1998 in particular was such a

terrible mess of corruption, and so on. But

why is it that now, unfortunately, in terms of

the level of corruption, by both objective and

subjective indicators, we appear to be moving toward

an ever worse situation? It seems to me,

was explained to me best yesterday

by Elena Panfilova, the head of the organization

Transparency International. She

spoke rather critically in one newspaper there

about

Medvedev's latest initiatives.

New anti-

corruption commissions are being set up. I called and asked, "Lena,

tell me, why are you criticizing all this so

harshly?" Well, I also have a fairly

critical view of it. But why do you?

She told me something very simple. She

said: "I was on these commissions and

proposed specific measures of my own in 2001.

Then I was on all the exact same

commissions and proposed the exact same

specific measures in 2004. Then

I was on similar commissions with specific

measures in 2008. Now they're inviting me

to the exact same commissions." And they're asking

for the very same measures in 2012. Since 2001,

absolutely nothing has been done.

Alexei, excuse me, please, excuse me,

let me stop you there. So, is this a personal

grievance on Panfilova's part?

A personal grievance, Panfilova's grievance. That's one

possibility. The second possibility is that things are

simply delayed. But if she proposed these measures

in 2001 and is proposing them again

in 2012, and they still need to be

proposed,

They do need to be proposed, you see; if you're going to fight it, you have to

propose them. And she keeps

proposing them. And although I don't take part in

all these commissions, for example,

through RosPil we put forward completely specific

proposals. Not just now—we made them earlier too.

And not just proposals: we draft

specific amendments, ready to go. Adopt

them. They didn't adopt them. And now

some new thing is starting up again. Let's

fight corruption, bring us

amendments for our new commissions. We bring them,

we do. But in order to actually

fight anything for real, you need

political will and genuine intent. I'd

point out that the first council for

combating corruption under the President of

Russia was created in what year? In 2004.

A national anti-

corruption plan was approved. What we're doing now

was already being done in 2008,

I think Kasyanov headed it, if I'm not mistaken.

Quite possibly. There were a lot of

absurd situations—remember how

everywhere, after the 2008 approval of the

national anti-corruption plan,

they started, under every agency,

creating their own councils for fighting

corruption. Remember in Moscow—who was it,

yes, Vladimir Resin was Moscow's

chief anti-corruption fighter. So what we

see is endless repetition. We just

have pure déjà vu here, but it

isn't filled with any practical

meaning.

Alexei, I can't argue with you there,

I'm just talking about something else.

Uh-huh.

I'm trying to understand the causes. When you

said that political competition and

media freedom—I would sign my name under every

word of that, because the

situation you're describing, and

describing, probably quite rightly in many

respects, is possible precisely

only in the absence of political

competition and media freedom. But I'd like to draw

your attention to the fact that we are now on

the media outlet Echo of Moscow, whose website gets 50

million visits a month.

Uh-huh. where the audience for our program is

around a million—well, 700,000 or so, yes.

So it's probably hard to say that these

conversations aren't taking place in the media.

Well, it seems to me you're being a little

disingenuous here, because Echo of Moscow

is clearly a rather unique media outlet, and

for example, what makes Echo of Moscow

unique for me, specifically for

me, is that it periodically covers the

investigations I conduct, whereas no

other mass media outlet

from the state-run ones—like

television and so on, Channel One,

Channel Two, Channel Three, Channel Four,

Channel Twenty-Five—has ever

covered anything from my investigations.

The only thing they

do cover is when, say, a criminal case is

opened against me,

then right away, uh, with great pleasure,

Channel One reports on it.

I see. All right, we'll come back to that specifically

later.

Just one last thing, if I may, on the subject of

causes. We can go deeply into

historical digressions and also

quite convincingly argue about

how, for example, the absence of

a Protestant ethic in our

society also had a serious impact, blah blah blah,

corruption, preconditions, and many

different factors. But nevertheless,

we now live in a kind of

post-industrial modern society

and in that society we exist roughly on equal terms

with China, the United States, and Europe.

Can you imagine how delighted

Medvedev must have been just now hearing your

words that we're already living in a

post-industrial office. We clearly are living in one.

Absolutely. The problem, the problem is

that—what is it—innovation. The huge

number of iPads at every meeting

proves it. No, Alexei, seriously speaking,

if we're being serious, do you understand what

troubles me in your explanation, when I

I’m trying to find the deeper causes, while they

have a kind of ready-made solution: leave

property owners alone, uh, let

the middle class rise, don’t touch

the rich, and then they’ll, well, this, this

society will somehow sort itself out and live on. But

who exactly are we appealing to here, who are

these people now? When you say that what’s needed is

a change in the political system, I

immediately have a question: if instead of Ivanov

comes Petrov, and instead of Sidorov, Kozlov, then

in this society we live in, after all

nothing will really change. It brings to mind

the old saying: why did you sell

the flies? At least those ones were full, but now

new ones will come, and they’ll be hungry.

Well, I definitely don’t agree with that

sort of eternal political

maxim. These old ones, supposedly, have already

stolen enough, and the new ones will come in, young

and hungry, and they’ll steal too.

Excuse me, but if we follow that principle, we’ll never

change anything. In that case, let’s just

leave everything as it is. Then let Vladimir Iosifovich

Resin keep fighting, always fighting

corruption. Fine. Who are we going to bring in?

All right. We’ve removed all of them. Who

comes next? What we need are, uh, political

decisions, systemic decisions, and any decisions

that will genuinely bring in

new people who are under, under

oversight and who bear political

responsibility for their decisions.

Hold on.

Hold on.

New people. Where are we supposed to get them? From

Mars? Are we going to import them from Mars or from another

country?

All right, the example may be overused, but take

the Georgian traffic police. Yes, I know

everyone is tired of hearing this example, but

let’s mention it anyway. In a single day

the traffic police were disbanded — 15,000 people.

A new unit was created with 3,000

people. Today, Georgia’s traffic police

really are not corrupt. People always object to this by saying,

“Come on, what is

Georgia — 2 million people. And what is Russia

— 142 million people? It’s impossible to do

something like that, to disband the entire traffic police tomorrow.”

But no one has even tried to do

this on the scale of a single federal

subject (region). We have federal subjects

that are fairly self-contained. Take

Primorsky Krai, or

Kaliningrad, which is small. You could

do something like that there and build

up a кадровый pool for the traffic police there. That’s the point.

But tell me, please,

the difference between Russia and Georgia is not

just that.

In my view, in Russia, in Russia

because of its vastness, because of

its cultural disintegration, the level of

patriotism is much lower than in Georgia. That’s

the first point. And second: keeping track of 15,000

new traffic police officers in Georgia

is easy, but in Russia you wouldn’t be able to exercise that kind of

control.

That’s exactly why I’m saying that,

first of all, we can start with smaller

regions. Let’s run this

experiment in Kaliningrad, in the Far

East, in the Caucasus, where it’s especially

needed, and start cultivating a new

elite there, because clearly we need

this on a much larger scale.

Yes, well, we do have rotation, excuse me,

of police chiefs. It exists. They

move around the country. That is an entirely

correct decision. That’s the first point. And

second, as for Georgia, yes, maybe

our level of

patriotism and some kind of

national consciousness is lower, but Georgia’s

starting conditions for fighting corruption were

far worse than ours. But remember

what Georgia was like in Soviet

times. A Georgian prosecutor was

the embodiment of corruption. In other words, everything there

was so deeply permeated by it, and

13-year-old boys dreamed of becoming

thieves-in-law (high-ranking criminal bosses), not cosmonauts, as

in the rest of the Soviet Union.

Georgia seemed the most hopeless of

all the Soviet republics when it came to

fighting corruption. And we can see that if even

they managed to do something, then we

certainly can too.

Don’t you think — this is a question, not

a statement — don’t you think that one

of the reasons for that kind of anti-corruption

drive among the Georgians was the poverty

of the Georgian population at that, at that

point in time?

Of course — the effect of starting from a very low base,

of course, without any doubt, was

a factor here. They were absolutely destitute and

understood there was nowhere further to fall. That was it,

they had hit rock bottom. But when they hit

rock bottom, they too could have sat around

discussing it among themselves. They could have said, well, you know,

historically we’re all

corrupt here. Historically

everything is so bad for us, it’s in our cultural roots.

Here, thieves-in-law (high-ranking criminal bosses) are everywhere

running everything and calling all the shots. So

let’s just do nothing.

Here’s a question. We have

an organization — I don’t remember what it’s

called, maybe you can remind me —

an organization that handles procurement

uh, for, for, well,

the State Reserve or Rosrezerv, whatever it’s

called, state procurement.

state orders. Now let’s imagine that

tomorrow the prime minister — the current one or a new one — summons you

and says:

"Alexei, you are sincerely fighting

corruption. I am offering you the opportunity

to take the position of director, head of

Rosrezerv (the Russian state reserves agency)."

Uh-huh.

You are, so to speak, a person who is not

corrupt, principled, all of that

great stuff. You take this position.

What will you do? Will you defeat

corruption in your own agency?

In the agency, yes. If I have

the political authority to appoint everyone

to their posts. To remove them from office,

of course.

And whom will you appoint to

these positions? Where will you get them from? From

friends and buddies?

Not from friends and buddies. Through open recruitment,

the way it is supposed to be done. We have

a law on the civil service, and it

spells out the procedure for how people

enter the civil service and

how, uh, I would point out that you

have, without noticing it yourself, supported, uh, one

of Medvedev's reform packages. Well, that is

I support practically all of Medvedev's packages,

except Medvedev himself does not

support them.

So, this very personnel service

that has been created—you criticized it

five minutes ago—the Anti-Corruption Council

has now presented you with

a candidate. Do you have any guarantee that

these people will not take bribes?

Guarantees, as the saying goes, can only be given by

the savings bank. There are no

guarantees. That is why mechanisms of

oversight are needed.

In the original source, it was an insurance

policy.

An insurance policy. Yes, sorry.

Gref—Gref has thanked you, of course, I

understand.

But no one can give guarantees. There must

be oversight mechanisms, there must be

mechanisms of political accountability.

So if someone does something wrong, they get

thrown out. They must. As for us, when it comes to

public procurement, which we work on,

and whose oversight we handle

professionally, then RosPil (Navalny's anti-corruption project focused on public procurement) is not merely

making some proposals—we, as I already

said, have drafted official amendments to

the law, both to Federal Law No. 94

currently in force and to the federal contract

system that is supposed to be

introduced.

By the way, do you support it?

The federal contract system as

a principle, I do not support, because

one of the main ideas in the federal

contract system is

the presumption that an official acts in good faith, which

we are clearly not ready for and which does not

correspond to reality, and that

will allow, in an entirely arbitrary

manner, the purchase of anything whatsoever, and

there are no oversight mechanisms there.

I found exactly the opposite there. I

found personal responsibility there

for the officer. No, it is there. It is there.

That is precisely the point: it exists only at the level

of a declaration. Have you actually read the draft

itself? It is not there. There, there is no

personal

liability spelled out. A person there can

buy anything whatsoever. Nabiullina

spoke about this in a declaration, but no

liability

is built in through

a completely different provision. Liability

for non-performance by officers handling

the contract is provided for in the criminal

code under official

crimes. You and I must have read different

sets of amendments. We devoted

an enormous amount of time to the federal contract system.

There was a great deal

of debate on this subject. In any case, we

are against it, but we are taking

a constructive position. We have offered

some very specific mechanisms for

how, within the existing system, without

breaking the entire political order and dismantling

the corrupt regime and all the rest of it,

how, within this system, one can

improve something, uh, in the sphere of

public procurement?

Where, where did you submit them? These

We, first of all, officially

submitted them to the Ministry of Economic

Development. We did send them. Right now

there are these working groups under

Medvedev's so-called "big government," which

I view skeptically, but I

see people there who are quite

sincere in their intentions and are working there.

Alexashenko, Guriev, Kovarsky, and so

on. They asked me to take part.

I said that we would not participate for

obvious political reasons, because

we do not believe anything will come of it, but

from RosPil we are officially submitting

these amendments to you. I brought them with me.

They are completely specific

things. Were they accepted or not, how

or somehow not?

Well, I do not know how this

"big government" will work; under its procedures

they do not formally adopt things. A significant, by the way,

part of our amendments, which we

sent to the Ministry of Economic

Development, was accepted. Some

things that were key for us, for example,

the possibility of filing a lawsuit in defense of

an indefinite group of persons, right? Because

right now I do not have the right to challenge,

for example, the actions of an investigative

a Russian committee that is buying itself

Infiniti SUVs. It’s unclear why. If

this provision is adopted, then I, as

Rospil, as a public organization,

will be able, on behalf of all Russian citizens,

simply to challenge the very necessity

of purchasing, for example, these SUVs,

or anything else—golden toilets,

and so on. At the conceptual level,

the Ministry of Economic Development

has accepted these ideas. If they are

implemented in legislation, then

excellent, great. But I just want

to make one specific point again.

Rospil has existed for a year. The project

Rospil. During this time, we have challenged

procurement tenders that we consider corrupt

successfully, totaling 40 billion rubles (about US$1.3 billion). In the

Federal Antimonopoly Service, there is a kind of quasi-judicial

procedure. In most cases, our

statistics show that we win 65 percent

of the time there. But behind practically

every canceled contract, there is

a specific corrupt official or a person

who abused their official

powers. The question is: how many people

have been held criminally liable?

Zero. How many people have even had

investigations opened against them at all?

Zero. How many people have been removed from

office? One, over the entire period. And this

is the sort of thing that no

public oversight controls. This is

exactly where we are talking about a caste of

untouchables.

You know, you’ve already spoken on this topic.

I promise that by the end of the program we’ll

return to this topic, but you know,

there’s that example—remember?—about half a glass

of cognac, right? For the optimist, it’s a whole half-glass;

for the pessimist, it’s only half a glass. In the original,

it’s about water.

I know the cognac version, yes.

Well then, the way you’re talking about this now,

you sound like a pessimist, indignantly saying:

no one was fired, no one was

jailed. But I’m listening to you as an optimist.

Just think how far we’ve come—in the good

sense of the phrase—that some

public organization, clearly not

pro-government,

in a state government

body, the Federal Antimonopoly Service, wins 65 percent of cases against

the government.

And I want to tell you—shall I explain why I’m

more of a pessimist? Because right now

this “big government” process is happening.

We’re invited there, called in, and there are

all sorts of wonderful discussions about how

organizations like

Rospil should actually be funded from the budget, and

so on. And against that backdrop, the department

for combating extremism is summoning all my

Rospil staff for

questioning, sending out various demands

to appear, and so on. So that’s

why I—why I’m telling you—I, I, I

I’ll comment on why your

employees might be summoned, but we’ll do that

after a short break on the air.

This is the program Dozhd... and today my

guest is Alexei Navalny.

We’ll be back in a moment.

Good evening once again. Duralex is on the air.

Host Mikhail Borchevsky, and the guest

of the program is blogger and lawyer Alexei

Navalny. Alexei, you could also be summoned

to the police because

you made some statement or published

something, and as a source

of information for further verification

the department for combating extremism.

But that’s the department for combating extremism.

Well, if so,

there’s no way extremism can be pinned on you.

I assume that perhaps some of my

political views might be

interpreted by some people, mistakenly,

as extremist. But as for the employees

of the Rospil project—the lawyers who sit

hunched over their laptops and dig through

state procurement records—it’s hard to accuse them of

extremism too. And that leaves me

confused and very saddened, and

it makes me very pessimistic, because

I can see that a significant part of

our ruling elite considers

anti-corruption activity

to be extremist, because, basically: why are you

sticking your nose in our business at all? Some random people,

five people got together and are interfering with

our state procurement. You know,

perhaps, perhaps, in some ways I agree

with you, and in some ways I don’t. Any

system protects itself. We’re not discussing now

whether it’s good or bad—any

system protects itself. Why am I

an optimist? Because

from my point of view, society has begun to recover

significantly. And this movement is coming

from both above and below. For example,

the Civic Chamber was created on the

initiative of the Kremlin, specifically Surkov (Vladislav Surkov, a senior Kremlin official),

who was constantly accused of

trying to steamroll the political system

into the asphalt, right? And yet he created

the Civic Chamber, which was in a sense

aimed against that.

Uh-huh. Medvedev, whose life is going perfectly well,

is creating a big

government, an open government,

that meets in front of cameras, with live

broadcasts on 24/7 channels,

where people tell him things that are not always pleasant,

where, in particular, Aleksashenko is present,

whom you mentioned as an example, and I could name a number

of others as well—very, very independent

and intelligent people.

So the movement is, on the one hand, from above—

the elites want it, and on the other hand, the grassroots

want it too. So I’m going to object now.

Go ahead.

And they all seem perfectly fine there, they’re sitting there

saying things on camera and so on.

For example, one of the areas of my

work—the main area of my

activity—is protecting the rights

of minority shareholders and protecting my own

rights as a minority

shareholder. And looking at their wonderful

big government bodies, how they sit there

discussing things and everything seems fine, I see

that Gazprom is endlessly disposing of assets,

conducting non-market deals, disposing of

property at prices several times

below market. And these deals involve

such wonderful people as Gennady

Timchenko, old friends of Vladimir

Putin. All of this is discussed quite openly

in the newspapers. Experts—not even

just me—say these are corrupt

deals. And it all happens with complete

impunity. Just complete

impunity. So the question is: the system

that protects itself consists of

specific people. So let’s identify those people

and punish them. Here’s another

excellent example. All right. That’s a very

nice phrase, yes: the system protects

itself. Let’s single out those people and

punish them. What exactly are you proposing

to do?

I’ll explain with a completely concrete example. Two

years ago I was sitting here in this very

studio on Sergei Guriev’s program and, uh,

I presented a program of mine here about

how to fight corruption in

state-controlled companies.

It was called something like “How in Six Steps

to Turn Gazprom into Something Decent.”

Entirely practical steps. A year later,

after a year, some of those steps were

adopted by President Medvedev, including

those. Not because I’m so clever, but

because some things were

obvious. One of those obvious things

was this: let’s

kick all officials off the boards

of directors of companies.

Everyone applauded that, myself included,

saying how wonderful it all was

being done. Then this year something happened:

I was nominated to the board

of directors of Aeroflot. I looked

at whom the state had nominated,

which

holds a substantial

stake in Aeroflot. I see Gleb Nikitin, deputy head

of the state property agency. Alexander Tikhonov,

department director at the Ministry of Transport.

Sergei Chemezov, CEO

of Rostec (Russian state corporation), formally not a civil servant,

but in practice one.

I think—excuse me—but in this case I don’t

believe you.

But this is official, these are

official data.

That’s impossible under the law.

Well, impossible or not, nevertheless it

happened,

it’s impossible under the law. I just can’t

believe that anyone would

Then may I ask you, as a high-ranking

official, to check this and react

with outrage. I can simply tell you

that the chairman of the board of directors

of Aeroflot

is a person who is not

a civil servant.

Yes, of course.

In private—in private business.

Yes, yes, yes. Look, this is an official

press release, these are official data

about what happened. So

here’s the question—to the audience, to

Medvedev, to everyone. Who is actually supposed

to do something about this? I’ll check that. That’s

a fair question. And who heads the board

of directors of Gazprom?

Androsov? No, Androsov.

Gazprom. Gazprom.

As for Gazprom, I don’t know. Zubkov. Zubkov.

Why is Zubkov sitting there? He’s a minister in

our government. What is Zubkov, who is

a deputy prime minister and deals with agriculture,

what is he doing at

Gazprom? And, and, and when I see

corrupt deals at Gazprom, those

deals are taking money from me. In other words,

this isn’t just some emotional

statement—they are robbing me.

Do you own Gazprom shares?

I do own Gazprom shares. I’m a Gazprom shareholder,

and there’s nothing to envy here,

you understand? I get nothing out of it.

And I don’t understand: if President Medvedev

decided this, and we all applauded him for it—well,

why? Who else can make

the system work, if not President

Medvedev? Why is this happening?

Tell me, please, just tell me plainly,

you’ve now led me into a kind of

philosophical question, haven’t you?

Just tell me plainly: President Medvedev or

President Putin,

do you think they can change the system

at will, all at once?

I believe—this is my absolutely firm

conviction—that they have

sufficient authority to

send a political signal

strong enough to begin

reforms. In other words, nothing is needed here

except sheer political will. If only there were

the desire.

Again, that’s a rather...

Let me remind you of one example. So, the summer

of the year before last, or last year

— the year before last, I mean — there was

political will. Medvedev introduced

amendments to Article 108 of the Criminal Procedure Code, stating that

businesspeople cannot be taken into custody on

economic charges before trial. Remember?

Yes.

Yes.

For three months, three months, people have been routinely taken into custody

left and right. There is no political will.

There is no political will whatsoever. Just as there is no

political will in exactly the same way.

You see, in the Daimler case, for example,

which I am also investigating, by now

everyone has spoken out.

You changed the subject well. But why?

It is absolutely the same thing.

Alexei. Alexei, so,

There is no political will; there is only a declaration.

When we say that in 2004

a committee to combat

when new tsars appeared in Russia

with political will, they were struck with a snuffbox

on the head. Because until you

blow up the system from within. Remember

how Gorbachev blew up the system from within?

That is an excellent example you gave. So,

Putin, I don’t know, Medvedev, and so on,

they do not want their friends, I don’t know,

the Rotenbergs, the Kovalchuks, and Timchenko

to hit them on the head with a snuffbox. Well then,

I do not need a president like that, one who

works only to make sure he does not get hit

on the head with a snuffbox and who protects

the interests of his friends. Excuse me, but I want

it to be different. You just reminded me

of a story. So, this was

somewhere,

I think, in the late 1940s or early

1950s, there was an opera like this. And

the point was the following, I think,

the author was Solovyov, though I may be mistaken. And

the point was this. So,

a certain serf comes to Ivan the Terrible (the Russian tsar),

not even a boyar, just a serf, and says: "Ivan,

how are you ruling? You are destroying great Rus'".

Ivan says: "All right, let’s do this. Right now

you will sit on my throne, and if by the end of the day

you do not ask to leave the throne yourself,

you shall be tsar; but if you ask to step down from

the throne, off with your head."

A few hours later, the serf said to him:

"Ivan, cut off my head."

Well, that is about the “galley slave,” you see?

They all supposedly have it so hard, and yet they sit there for

12 years and do not want to leave. I gave you

an example. I gave you an example, uh,

and from opera I can give another example,

although we are straying far beyond the bounds of the

program. But when I entered government 11 years ago,

I,

well, I was just a little older than you are

today, and it seemed to me that,

well, everything could be solved so simply.

Over these 11 years, I have understood that not a single

issue has a simple solution. That is,

of course, not literally every single one, but if only there were

the desire to solve them.

Right. And as for the desire to solve things,

just look at what we have. You

mentioned Transparency International,

and over the course of a year Russia’s position in

this ranking, according to Transparency

International, did not worsen — on the contrary,

it improved. We moved up, I think,

by five or seven places. Our position

by six places. Still low, of course, but

from 142nd to something — still low anyway, but

we did fulfill certain formal

requirements. It is wonderful that we

fulfilled them. That is good. How long

has society been demanding

the declaration

of officials’ spending?

Complete nonsense. Declaring spending

is impossible, as I have said many times. And

in the end, today we have, from my point

of view, an absolutely excellent, at this

stage, draft law on monitoring

spending, which makes life much harder

for corrupt officials. It really does.

It will be hard to push through. You speak

about the system — there was political will. Here,

Medvedev introduces a package on reforming

the political system. What kind of

resistance immediately arose in the Duma?

What resistance? United Russia

passed what he wanted. United Russia

has a majority there. I see no

resistance at all. He introduced it just fine.

Wonderful. But I have another question.

All right. What kind of political

will do they need? Or additional mechanisms or

levers in order to investigate the Daimler

case, in order to investigate the

Magnitsky case? As far as I know,

as far as I know about Daimler, there

it turned out that the procurement was carried out

back in the 1990s, the contract

was signed then.

No, you are wrong there — many

different transactions took place over

many years. Daimler

in the United States admitted that they paid

bribes to Russian officials from the Interior Ministry, the Federal Protective Service, (FSO),

the Defense Ministry, and so on. Daimler

in Russia officially acknowledged this, but

the investigation is stalled. Why is that?

Because they are waiting for the statute of limitations

to expire there, from 2002 to 2007. Here

is information that from 1997 to 2002 the main

bribes were paid.

And since this investigation

was initially conducted by the Department of Justice in

the United States, we requested all those documents.

For some reason, the Prosecutor General’s Office needed

a lot of time for that, whereas we did it all

within a week. They are completely open

and publicly accessible. And all these tables and

the names of offshore companies, all of it

is there. But indeed, our

investigative bodies, the Investigative

Committee of the Russian Federation, are busy

dragging the case out and waiting until

the statute of limitations expires. That’s all.

Once again, here we are, and it’s hard for us

to talk. Neither you nor I

have the documents. According to my information, there

all the procurements, those criminal

procurements, took place in the late 1990s.

No, that’s not true. The last procurement in

this particular case was in 2007.

And all these people are still working. No, I’m not

in a position, not in the position, to

claim that everything here is

just great, understand. I

Yes, things are very far from great here,

things are not great at all. But I just

want to draw your attention to something. You know,

this is where you and I disagree.

Uh-huh.

You say there is no political

will, that nothing is happening. Right now

there. I just want to draw your

attention to this. You keep

referring to the fact that these people bought this,

those people bought that, others bought something else. But

tell me, please, by whose

political will did data on all procurements become

available online?

It would be foolish to deny that Putin did many remarkable

things in the period from 2000 to 2003.

And the law,

Federal Law No. 94, which at the time

our officials simply let slip through,

ended up becoming a law that we now

criticize a great deal, but which really

did allow us to track procurements—this

really is to Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin’s credit.

Yes.

What did you just say?

A law that officials simply let slip through. So

what you’re saying, then, is that

for that same Putin, when he

does show political will, he has to

first and foremost overcome

the systemic resistance of officials. We

elected him president. Yes.

No, is that so or not?

Of course, of course it is. But I want him

to keep showing that will and

keep overcoming it. But he isn’t doing that. And

at the same time, you say that if today

we change the system, change the leaders, if, say,

let’s put it this way, yes, appoint you

to some position or other, then

you would overcome this resistance from officials

with the snap of a finger.

I mean this absolutely seriously. I

want to say that up until 2003 he

was overcoming something, but now he is overcoming nothing

and is simply drifting along this

wonderful river of corruption of ours; nothing

is happening. I don’t like discussing

people who aren’t present in the studio with us

Unfortunately, Vladimir Putin does not

want to answer us a specific, concrete question.

Let’s take this: a penalty was introduced for

bribery.

By the way, may I ask—

You mean the multiple fines?

Yes. And by the way, how do you

define the term corruption?

Is corruption bribery, or

something else?

How do I define it? We need to agree on the terms.

How do you define

corruption—is it bribery, or is it

something else?

No, corruption can include

bribery, abuse

of office. These are certain

deliberate actions that lead to

illegal enrichment. I would—I interpret

it broadly like that. Different things can always

be included. Corruption can be

state corruption, commercial corruption—

all kinds of corruption exist. I’m just—I’m not

saying this to correct you.

I just use the term

corruption differently.

So then, corruption does not necessarily lead

to financial enrichment. For example,

telephone justice in court (informal pressure by phone). That is also

corruption, even though it does not necessarily mean

that the person who made the call

received money. Corruption is

the use of official position

in a way that is not in accordance with the law.

Well then that would mean virtually any violation

of the law gets lumped under corruption. I

am inclined to interpret it more narrowly here, but

that’s not a matter of principle.

No, why am I bringing this up? Because

I just misspoke myself, I said it

incorrectly. Multiple liability for

corruption—multiple liability for

bribery,

Yes. The so-called multiple fines

introduced under Medvedev. What do you think of them? I

regard them, uh,

not very favorably. Fine, they introduced them,

wonderful. But it’s a pointless measure.

In fact, I was just looking at an interview,

I even brought into the studio an interview with the chief

anti-corruption fighter, Mr. Sugrobov,

from the Interior Ministry. Here he gives examples

of two cases involving multiple fines. So far we have

had cases where multiple fines were imposed. These were

a court bailiff in Moscow and the head

of one of the districts in Tatarstan. Well,

Sugrobov is mistaken, because, well, this

is a recent interview from a week ago,

and he doesn’t have the full picture, because a month

ago there was a hearing in the Supreme Court.

in court, where Lebedev was giving examples, not

giving an example, but citing statistics,

so, as for multiple fines, such fines

were applied in 35%

of bribery cases that were heard

in court. So we are talking about thousands.

Not dozens, but thousands.

What is happening is wonderful. Here,

if we just take the statistics

of the Investigative Committee, it will also

tell us that 11,000 cases were

referred, investigations were launched into

corruption-related offenses. As for the verdicts

that were handed down. All right, Alexei, so are you in favor of

this measure or against it?

I think this measure can be added,

but fundamentally it does not

solve anything. In that case, what needs to be done is,

what needs to be done is to strip the untouchables of this

immunity.

That’s the fifth time you’ve said that already.

Because right now, look,

there is no need to change anything in the Criminal Code.

What needs to be changed is

in how it is applied; there is no need to change anything in

the Criminal Code, but in the practice of its

application.

And I, as someone who represents

a public organization that

investigates corruption, including

cases involving minority shareholders. I do not need, for heaven’s sake,

all these new innovations in

the Criminal Code. What I need is one very

simple thing. When I appeal

the actions of police officers under

Article 125, I need the courts to do what they are

supposed to do. Because I have

a situation where I am conducting

an investigation, for example into VTB, and I have already

identified absolutely everyone involved there. The police

constantly refuse me

the opening of a criminal case. I constantly

have the police’s inaction declared unlawful,

and nothing happens. No one is

fired, no one is held

accountable, nothing.

So, to the two postulates we agreed on,

a competitive

political system and free media,

it turns out we need to add a third.

That is an independent

judiciary. Well, we devoted our previous program

to the point that without an independent

judiciary, we will achieve nothing at all.

So that is a kind of constant. The most

important thing is that there must be no

untouchables. We can send as many

teachers, doctors, and low-level

officials as we like to the

defendants’ bench. But unfortunately, that is not

at all what happens with senior

officials. I have already given an example as proof.

By the way, Kolya, since you brought this up,

tell me, please, in

your view, what percentage of

Russia’s total corruption and bribery

budget is accounted for by

petty, everyday, grassroots

corruption, and what percentage by top-level

official corruption?

It’s impossible. I cannot calculate that,

because there is no objective

data here, and it is impossible to calculate. Although,

probably, if we add up all the bribes

that—if we add up all the bribes

that were paid in order to,

as they say, get someone out of military service,

then of course that would amount to more than was

stolen at Gazprom. But adding all that up

is impossible.

Why did I ask? Well, actually,

perhaps the social danger is

somewhat different,

there is, there is another issue, yes, of course.

So, there is

a kind of study by specialists.

They cite a figure of 80%

for grassroots corruption, around 17% for corruption

at the middle level, meaning municipal-level

officials, that middle

tier, and accordingly about

3% for top-level corruption.

Do you know what this refers to? The funniest thing is

that this is not by number of cases, but by amounts. I do not

know what data they could have

used to arrive at these figures, but

look, President Medvedev said

that out of 5 trillion rubles

allocated to public procurement, 1 trillion is stolen

—and he used the word “stolen.” No,

he said “used inefficiently”; he

said that 1 trillion is embezzled. I

think that figure is a little

inflated, a little less is embezzled,

but it is still a substantial amount. And it is obvious to me

that most of this money goes to

the biggest contracts and contractors. These are

mostly construction work and all sorts of

things like that. And if we look at

public procurement statistics, Forbes magazine recently

did an excellent study

called "The Kings of Public Procurement." We will see that

the main contractors across all public procurement are

the same old people, namely

the Rotenbergs, the Kovalchuks, Timchenko,

and so on. There is simply no getting away

from these names.

Let’s move on from those names. I am neither

their prosecutor nor their lawyer. I want

to talk about something else. Just remember,

please, Chuichenko reporting

to Medvedev about those

about the tomographs: four criminal cases

have been opened so far. I think they jailed

one person there.

What matters to you: how many people were jailed, or how many

were jailed?

No, what matters to me is that tomographs be purchased

under the normal procedure.

Okay. So here’s what happens. Basically,

there are four criminal cases there, involving

about 30 people, I think. So, they removed

just about everyone from their posts, I think,

absolutely all of them. Who were they? They were deputy mayors

and deputy governors who were responsible.

They were all removed from office. The criminal

cases are ongoing, under investigation. The price

of tomograph procurements the following year

fell by 50% after that report.

Yes, great.

Effective.

No, ineffective. Completely ineffective,

because all of this happened only after

the President of the Russian Federation,

held a special meeting on these

tomographs, spoke about specific

tomographs, waved papers around, handed them to Chushchenko,

and they really threw their entire

political weight behind

solving this specific tomograph issue. And I

have plenty of cases like that. So what should be done?

At the very least, adopt our amendments, under which

I, Alexei Navalny, when I

discover a case like this tomograph one, do not need

a political order from Medvedev. I myself

can file a lawsuit in defense of an indefinite group

of persons. And in court my claim will be considered

fairly, and this procurement will be

canceled. And then—

I support that, I do, just one

small clarification. And if your claim

turns out to be unfounded, then

If it’s unfounded, I’ll lose.

And that’s it.

That’s how it works in court, isn’t it?

The state fee, of course—the court fee.

I’ll pay the court fee. If they want

to sue me over honor and

dignity, let them sue. In matters of honor and

dignity, everyone has access to judicial

protection. But if I win—and

as I already said, at the FAS (Federal Antimonopoly Service) I win in

65% of cases—I would like

the Prosecutor General’s Office to find out

why. Because it’s not just random—here in our

public procurement system, you know, there’s this strange

setup: some regional Interior Ministry office

starts buying gasoline at 30% above market price,

we go to the FAS, we win, we get the contract canceled,

and that’s it—canceled, canceled. ‘It didn’t work out,’

as they say. ‘Oops, my bad.’ But why is there no

investigation? Why did this

happen? On this point, I’m completely on your

side. Absolutely. I can even

boast that I came up with one

idea that has now been included in

the national plan. Today, our

officials are incentivized to say no

to an applicant, because if they say yes,

questions may be asked—whether they said yes

because of a bribe. But if they say

no, nothing will happen to them for that.

Right?

Yes. So the idea was this, and it has

now, I repeat, been included in

the National Anti-Corruption Plan for

2013. If

an official says no, and that decision is overturned

in court, then the official pays

a fine.

That way, we incentivize officials to understand that

saying yes is safe, while saying no

is risky. You can get hit with a fine for it.

Here we also come to the issue of the courts, so that

the courts actually rule. Right. Yes. That’s, that’s

something we already agreed on in the first program. So

here’s what I’m getting at: I’m your conceptual

supporter

in the sense that officials’ accountability should be made

public,

public through the courts, I mean. It should be possible

to appeal their decisions, yes, but

I want to stress that the applicant as well

must also

please,

That is already implemented exactly. If right now

officials place a procurement order improperly,

they can be fined by the

antimonopoly service. It’s also a kind of

quasi-judicial procedure. In practice, of course,

when they rig a tomograph tender

from which they can pocket a million dollars,

and then pay a fine of 50,000 rubles,

that’s hardly a problem for them. But this isn’t just

about the fine. It’s really a matter of

criminal prosecution. And I

would like every case in which we

have proven that a procurement was unlawful

to trigger at least a preliminary inquiry under

Article 144.

If that’s what you meant, then I already agree

with you—no need to persuade me. One thing

one issue, one issue really

concerned me. You mentioned a court fee. And I’m

simply against irresponsibility on either

side—whether officials or

public organizations. What amount of

court fee would you be prepared to pay?

For my right to file a lawsuit?

Yes, for the right to file a lawsuit in the interests

of

A minimal one—small and fixed.

For example, we argued for a very long time with the

antimonopoly service, which

was trying—though overall we more or less

support what it does, even though

we argue with them a lot and are constantly in court

with them. They wanted to introduce a fee

proportional to the value of the state contract. So, for example,

to challenge a state contract worth

a billion, I would have to somehow come up with

100,000 rubles from who knows where and pay that

court fee. That is completely unacceptable.

After all, I file lawsuits in defense of an indefinite

group of persons, effectively. So let it be 500

rubles—I’m willing to put that up. Yes.

Then it turns out that your lawsuit was

groundless. That means the time of the

court staff reviewing it, and of the company's lawyers in

the case against whom you filed it, has been wasted. That

all adds up to those same 100,000.

Let them claim costs from me, just as I

would like to be able to claim costs. For

example, that's exactly what I'd really like. Wait,

wait. So you're prepared for the idea that

in addition to the filing fee, the applicant could also be

charged costs?

Reasonable costs should be recovered. But,

still,

Reasonable—what does that even mean? I don't know. There's no such

real practical definition. Well, let mine

be whatever—documented costs, then. And let

me have that right too, because

right now the RosPil project is funded

simply by people sending money to it.

20,000 people send about 400 rubles each.

And if for every case that we

handle before the antimonopoly service or in

court, the real costs were recovered,

Agre—

then we'd be sitting pretty. Unfortunately,

our courts tell me:

"You know, a day of work by your lawyer, or

your day of work as an attorney, is worth 200

rubles. Goodbye."

Well, I think that's your problem, and that's

well known. Great."

Tell me, please, would you come to

parliamentary hearings in the State Duma (the lower house of Russia's parliament) if

you were invited?

Depends on the topic. Depends on the invitation.

Parliamentary hearings are, in many

cases, a meaningless waste of time. We

go to such events all the time

when they are substantive.

That's a lot of words, sorry, a lot of

words here. Will you personally come if you're

invited on a relevant topic, if there is

something to be gained from it? I go to them all the time,

I'll come. I go to them all the time, we draft

amendments; we're not invited to parliament. If you're invited to

parliament, will you come?

I will.

Okay. Now imagine that for 30

minutes you became the president of the Russian

Federation.

Yes. Three decrees you would sign in

30 minutes. Three decrees, three laws.

I would create

an independent anti-corruption

body, similar to

the one created in Hong Kong,

similar to what exists in

Singapore, and so on. And, you know,

let's

that's just

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

How much will the position of head of

that body cost?

Ah, well, it won't cost anything. I won't be

selling it, and with the next—next

law I'll make sure that this position cannot

be sold. Yes. And third—

look, consider such a body, all right?

Would you give it the functions of the Investigative

Committee, the Prosecutor General's Office, the FSB (Federal Security Service)? It should not

be a body that simply turns into

some mega-FSB, KGB, or whatever. It

should be a fairly small, compact body,

whose expenses,

of course, are actually covered. In the U.S. we have

independent prosecutors; they have not

usurped, in fact, all

functions. They are, in fact, also

quite constrained, but they can

conduct truly independent

investigations. What we really need is

10 such structures, 10 independent

prosecutors, each with their own staff.

I want to understand: independent prosecutors,

a special prosecutor—that's something I,

fully support, I've been saying that for a long

time, but that has nothing to do with

creating special anti-corruption

bodies. What exactly are we talking about now?

We're talking about special anti-corruption

bodies. And here I mean independent

prosecutors in the country. Are they appointed by the Senate

in America at all?

Well, in America, yes. Here they could be appointed

in different ways. We don't have a Senate.

There is no Senate. In parliament there's United

Russia, which basically does whatever

the executive branch tells it to do. We

need an independent anti-corruption

body.

Independent from whom?

Independent

Who would it report to? The president? That's

an asterisked institution.

Uh, it would not even report to the president

once it is created. It would

be accountable to a public commission that

would, among other things, oversee its

control. It would be accountable more

to parliament.

So it would have some kind of coercive

powers.

It would have a large number of coercive

powers.

Hello, Alexei. Alexei, sorry.

Well

that's impossible in law.

It is possible, Mikhail. In law, that's not impossible.

In law, everything is possible,

well, there is a separation into three branches of government,

right? So which branch of government would you place this

body into?

This body would, naturally, be

part of the executive branch. It is not

necessarily the case that it would be directly

controlled by the president.

And who would it be accountable to, in your view?

All right, let's, let's discuss what

there is such a term as being under control. To remove and

appoint the head, to direct his

activities. Right now, the Prosecutor General's Office

is under the president's control. The Prosecutor General's Office

does not fit into any branch of government. That is

its problem. In our country, the Prosecutor General's Office,

if you look at our Constitution, does not

fit into any branch of government.

So, is something like that possible in law or

impossible? Does our Prosecutor General's Office

exist or not? Or is it floating around in space

somewhere? How is that even pos

It exists, and that is why there are constantly

problems with it, all the time

problems arise. Not a single Prosecutor General in our country

has ever left office without a scandal. Precisely

because it is not a systemic institution. It

is not integrated into any system of government.

It exists. It does exist nonetheless.

All right. As the president's representative in

the courts, did you ever once challenge

the very existence of the prosecutor's office? Tell

me, please. Please tell me,

so are you proposing to make this body

along the lines of the Prosecutor General's Office? That is,

No, I am proposing to make the body according to the

principles of the prosecutor's office. Let's not

distort things here. We need

a truly independent body that

Independent from whom?

Independent from the executive branch.

But you just said that it should

be part of the executive branch. It

should be a legislative body under

the parliament, not the executive

branch. Again, returning to the

existing strange prosecutor's office, it

is still more likely part of the executive

branch. We all understand that.

In the Constitution, it is placed in the section on

the judiciary. But never mind.

Well, as for the judiciary, we all understand that we

have attached it there in a rather strange way

somehow. Never mind the prosecutor's office. This

body here—what is it? It should

be created. It should be created by the president

in such a way that it would not subsequently be subordinate

to the president, so that it could not

be subjected to pressure or influence

from various officials, and so on. This is

entirely possible. Such a body was created,

for example, in Hong Kong,

it was created by

the Governor of Hong Kong, but nevertheless

the body was generally independent.

Independent. We need to create something like that here.

Therefore, the person who creates this

body must have the political

will and sufficient

political resolve not to interfere

in the work of this body afterward.

Excuse me, but this is already pure demagoguery.

Demagoguery. Because when you say

you want to create an independent body, one that is not

subordinate to anyone, but is created

by the president—I heard you, that's your 30

minutes. Your decree. Your second decree,

the one we were talking about, uh, that decree,

which would concern reforming

the judicial system. But you understand, this is

also demagoguery—your three decrees.

Say the first three words when you become

president. But this is not a decree; these should

be comprehensive bills that

address various decisions.

of the judicial syst,

that this

program, I understand what is being discussed, since

this is obviously judicial reform, reform of the judi

cial system,

it is obvious, obvious what may be included in that.

The third decree

is reform of the political system, because

without reform of the political system

nothing else can remain as it is. But here

please clarify what exactly you mean by that. In

that, I mean, uh, eliminating

the possibility of some

party usurping power, and ensuring the ability to participate in

parliamentary, presidential, and

elections at all levels for all citizens, without

any possibility for some election

commissions to remove them from registration, which is what

happens in our country, to bar them from

elections, and so on.

Let's stop there. I want to sort this

out.

So, this possibility or impossibility of

usurpation of power—does that mean that

we are talking about legislatively

introducing limits on a political

party having more than, say, 40%

of the seats?

No, that is complete nonsense.

We do not need that.

So if

if they won fairly and got 80%,

if 80% of the population

voted for that party and it received

80%, then that is not usurpation of power.

Of course that is not usurpation of power. When

you talk about usurpation of power,

do you mean that we are limiting

presidential terms?

Yes.

Uh, how do you see that working?

No more than two terms in our system. No

more than two terms. Period. But the point is not even

that. The point is that right now in our country

political parties either do or do not participate

in election campaigns

at various levels depending on how

the election

commission decides. The third part. Wait. No,

we have covered two. We have covered two.

For the record, I personally believe

that under our conditions there should be one

presidential term—seven years, with no right

re-election. If we're talking about

preventing the usurpation of power,

two terms means 8 years, fine, if people

support you. Two terms, 8 years, and that

includes elections along the way. And I'm saying seven years, one

time only. And two terms is not 8 years, but two

terms today already means 12 years.

Well, actually.

And now, as for election

commissions. Removal, non-removal. Do you

think that the new package introduced by

Medvedev doesn't resolve this

problem?

It absolutely does not. The new

package really is a breakthrough in terms of

creating political parties, because

500 people are enough to register one

without collecting signatures.

Signature collection remains, and so does

the possibility for a commission, by an arbitrary

decision, to let someone onto the ballot or not

in an election. In our most recent

municipal elections, which were held

at the same time as the presidential election, do you know

how many municipal candidates were removed

from registration? 600 people. And

they only needed to collect 42 signatures.

Yes, that falls under your second decree. I

understand that as judicial reform.

Here I

But here it wasn't the election

commissions that removed them, it was the territorial election

commissions of the district.

But the only thing you can do is appeal the decision

of the election commission in court. And the court

sided with the election commission.

Why?

It's a systemic issue. We need to

eliminate the possibility of an election

commission deciding on its own whether to

admit someone or not. If you want to run and you

have collected what is required, that's it, you go into the election. No one

— not even the Justice Ministry — should be able to

check you endlessly or refuse you or

say that your charter does not

comply. You want a political

party, you have 500 people,

fine, go run in the election.

I see. All right, now a few more

questions. Uh, I don't think this will be

the last time we meet, but still, today I

want to ask a few personal

questions.

Go ahead, of course.

Do you have a family?

Yes, I have two children.

And how does your wife feel about your

work?

She takes it well. She

supports it.

She supports it. No, isn't she afraid? Doesn't she

ever say, "Calm down,

stay out of it"?

There are various aspects of what I do

that are connected with the fact that,

well, from time to time all sorts of

uncomfortable situations arise for the family as

well. But that's part of the territory. We lived— she

she is your ally.

She is my ally, of course.

And one more question. This isn't a provocation, let me say that

right away. I'm just genuinely

curious.

I believe you.

Uh, you're 35. You're very articulate. You

have, in my view, uh,

well, all the makings of someone who could

be active in public and civic

life. You're a lawyer — don't you ever want

to take your family and leave for a normal

country where none of these problems exist,

and just live peacefully?

No. I've never had that

desire. If I had, if there had been, if there had been

the opportunity and the desire, I would have

left already. For example, I lived in the U.S. for half a year

while studying. And I don't like

living there. I don't like speaking in anything but Russian.

I like it here, generally speaking,

I'm quite comfortable. Moscow is one of the best

cities. If it weren't for the terrible traffic jams, I would

enjoy Moscow

every second. And most importantly, I

absolutely believe that we can change

everything here. I don't understand why

it's as if some storm cloud is hanging over

Russia with a curse on it or something. What's wrong with us?

Why can't we live exactly

the way people live in Germany or in

Finland?

I'll explain why I asked that

question. When I came back from America, where

I had lived not for half a year but for three years,

and where I was offered a contract that was fantastic

by the standards of the time, with a completely

crazy amount of money — my salary

was supposed to be higher than the salary

of the U.S. president at that time.

And I came back here when the contract ended,

so I returned here. And I was also

asked why I hadn't stayed, why

I hadn't left. That was in the early 1990s.

And I was listening to you with a smile just now, because

it was word for word the same. The only thing I also

added was birch trees. That's all. But everything else

was exactly the same. And I believe that too.

There are plenty of birch trees in Connecticut,

Yes. Well, I was in Washington, and there

weren't any birch trees there. Although no, there were, actually,

there were. Anyway, I, uh,

am still an optimist, as I said at the beginning of the

program. Do you know what makes me happy?

At the very beginning I said that you and I

stand on opposite sides on many issues,

but there is also a great deal that

unites us.

Even though you consider yourself a pessimist,

you are an optimist too. You believe that,

that it is possible to live normally in Russia.

Unlike me, you do not see—you do not

see that there is movement coming from both directions and

from above and from below to make

life normal. It seems to you

that there is such a movement from below? Experience

suggests that my—my empirical

experience suggests exactly the opposite. Unfortunately,

my empirical experience

suggests that those at the top very often

offer things that those below are not ready for.

Now, I am not saying that I am right, I am not

saying that you are right. I am saying

that your belief and mine are the same.

And I believe that despite the fact that I have

a whole lot of criticisms of your work

from the standpoint of, well, at times populism,

at times lack of proof, this

superficiality,

that is my point of view, right? But even so,

the fact that there are such restless

people as you, and the fact that you are invited

to these hearings and those hearings, that

the Ministry of Economic Development considers your

proposals, and that you

win 65% of your cases in the Federal Antimonopoly Service. All of this

gives me grounds to believe that our

society is becoming healthier, despite the fact

that you are not guaranteed against another five or

perhaps fifteen days in detention.

Well, thank you. A kind word is pleasant even to a cat

.

I am an absolute optimist that sooner

or later, naturally, we will achieve

what we want and live in a normal country,

and we have everything we need to live in

a normal, prosperous country. I am not sure

that this government can sincerely work

toward that and is truly leading us in

the right direction. But we will—believe

me, really, believe me—that

it can and wants to. Believe me, just as I believe

you, so believe me: it wants to and

it can.

I believe that you are an absolutely

wonderful person and a brilliant lawyer.

But on this question—whether the government

is leading us in the right direction—I, forgive

me, am not prepared to believe you, but we will

put pressure on it in order to

correct the direction of its movement and

replace it, if we have enough strength

to replace it—and we will have enough strength,

enough strength for that, sooner or later.

It would also be good, in the end, to know

whom you intend to replace it with. I think

not with yourself—or with yourself?

When we talk about replacing the authorities with

normal people who will

hold office, work according to

the rules, and then leave

office without carrying out suitcases full of

property.

I see. Let me remind our listeners that

my guest on air was Alexei Navalny,

lawyer, blogger, founder and creator

of the website Rospil.info.

Until next time. All the best.

I suggest we record a second

program right after this so it does not go to waste. We went well

over

well, about 10 minutes over.

Wow.

So, I want to say in advance, Alexei,

so, at the beginning, at the beginning I will ask

the editors to trim the start. We—I

say that my program is not

edited, so since we

ran over, yes, definitely, since we

went 10 minutes over,

I will now ask how much extra time Lyosha (diminutive of Alexei) can give us,

of additional time,

but this will have to be edited not in terms of

meaning. At the beginning, I was a little

sharp with you there. I understand that

that is just the nature of the format.