Don’t worry about Catalonia. Yes, the police there are currently using violence against the referendum organizers, but the referendum itself is being conducted by the local authorities—that is, genuinely elected mayors, the governor, and the regional parliament. The Catalan police are refusing to obey the Spanish police.
So they’ll be fine in Catalonia. In both Barcelona and Madrid, people will keep earning salaries five times higher than yours, and in the evenings they’ll sit on restaurant terraces drinking coffee. And no one will have to carry buckets for water, the way it is happening in 2017 in the city of Arkhangelsk, where I am holding a meeting today.
St. Petersburg is much closer than Catalonia, and here it’s not just that a referendum is impossible—officials have openly declared that they are above the law, the constitution, the courts, and common sense. They’re not even embarrassed about it.
The situation is simple. We properly submitted an application to hold the meeting—I recorded a video about it. Before that, we had been filing applications for several weeks, but all we heard from the administration’s official spokesperson was “you are provocateurs”.
This time they answered even more clearly: if you didn’t understand the official spokesperson, then the vice governor of St. Petersburg will answer the question:
We did not intend to allow it, do not intend to allow it, and will not allow it in the future.
In other words, all of us—I assume I would not have been alone at the rally—were officially informed that we have been stripped of our civil rights and are regarded more like inanimate objects such as curb stones, front entrances, and, excuse me, even shawarma (using St. Petersburg local terms), which of course exist in the city, but no one is going to let them hold rallies, take part in elections, or open their mouths at all.
I am not prepared to accept the issue being framed this way. Not at all. Not in the slightest. Especially since the law is clearly on our side. Under it, we were supposed to receive a response to our application—either approval or a refusal with an alternative location proposed—by the end of the day on Thursday. And if no such response is received, that means the authorities have no objections and the rally is approved. So, strange as it may seem, legally our rally on October 7 at 6:00 p.m. on the Field of Mars is authorized.
I will come to this rally, and I call on all residents of St. Petersburg who are not willing to be equated in rights with curb stones and shawarma to join us. This will be an entirely peaceful and lawful event. If we are allowed to carry out our lawful application—to set up a stage and speak normally—then we will gather and remain on the Field of Mars. If officials do not allow us to do that, then we will gather on the Field of Mars and march to Palace Square.
Be sure to come. If we sit at home, they’ll soon have us doing corvée labor on their dachas (country houses).
The event group on VKontakte is here, and on Facebook—here.
P.S. If you live in St. Petersburg, then “read it and pass it on.”