You probably know that in Kaluga Region, our Democratic Coalition found itself in an unpleasant situation that I had not commented on until today.
Here’s what happened:
We stated that the candidate list for the election would be formed solely on the basis of the primary results.
All participants in the primaries signed an agreement recognizing the results.
The Kaluga branch of RPR-PARNAS signed a declaration stating that it would recognize the primaries and nominate only the list that was elected.
The main contest for the top spot on the list unfolded between human rights activist Tatyana Kotlyar (who heads the Kaluga branch of PARNAS) and physicist Andrei Zayakin, one of the founders of "Dissernet" (a Russian volunteer network that investigates plagiarism in academic dissertations).
Zayakin won by a narrow margin. Accordingly, the list should have been: Zayakin. Kotlyar. Kuznik.
And then this unpleasant thing happened. The Kaluga branch gathered for the formal nomination, where its leader, Tatyana Kotlyar, said: the primaries are all well and good, but we believe a list headed by me has better prospects. There were about 15 to 18 people at the meeting, and by a one-vote margin they approved the list as Kotlyar, Zayakin, Kuznik, and submitted it to the election commission today.
The calculation is obvious: surely no one would start a scandal, expel people from the party, or dissolve a regional branch on the eve of an election. People would swallow it somehow and let it slide. After all, the margin was small. Zayakin was first, and now he is second. It’s not as if he was pushed to the bottom.
But we are building an honest political process, and we are basing it on the rules of fair play. No one will be allowed to “slightly adjust” the results of open and fair primaries.
Therefore:
7.
The federal political council of PARNAS has now convened and removed Tatyana Kotlyar from the list for violating the rules of the primaries and breaking her own word; this is permitted under the law. As a result, Andrei Zayakin will head the democratic opposition’s list in the Kaluga Region election, in accordance with the voting results.
I am very glad that our colleagues in PARNAS acted so clearly and uncompromisingly, demonstrating their commitment to democracy, fair play, and coalition agreements.
This matters. We have to train ourselves to understand that promises and agreements carry weight. If you sign something today and disown your signature tomorrow, then you are out of the process altogether.
We need to teach opposition leaders, party functionaries, and regional party leaders alike that elections are not a private insiders’ affair, but a shared process in which the views of activists and supporters about candidates carry the same weight as the views of party members.
People who, after work, go stand at a campaign cube (a street canvassing stand), handing out leaflets, and people who donate their own money to the campaign—they should be the ones choosing whom to stand for and whom to pay for.
The era of quiet, opaque backroom deals at the Moscow or regional level must come to an end. Our voters have the right to understand why certain people appear on the list in a particular order.
We will have no right to call ourselves the democratic opposition in an election if we ourselves cannot guarantee that voters’ will, as expressed in the primaries, is respected, and that the agreed procedures are followed honestly.
Let there be fair play, even if it requires unpleasant decisions.