A post for residents of Yekaterinburg and anyone interested in what’s happening in the city. Please read and share. What’s happening in Yekaterinburg right now? **They’re trying to abolish the mayoral election in Yekaterinburg. **The old mayor, Chernetsky, is being sent off into honorable retirement to the Federation Council (the upper house of Russia’s parliament) — long overdue after 18 years in office — and, obviously, United Russia and the new governor of Sverdlovsk Region want to push through some crook of their own. But they’re having problems with that. Because Yekaterinburg residents, with typical Ural bluntness and persistence, are telling United Russia and Governor Misharin to go to hell. In particular, in the most recent regional Duma elections, United Russia got 39% (its lowest result anywhere in the country). In Yekaterinburg itself, the result was under 35%, and in Nizhny Tagil it was under 30%. And that was with a vigorous and powerful use of administrative resources. Every poll out there shows that under the current circumstances, Yekaterinburg could elect absolutely anyone as mayor — even a Martian — but not a United Russia representative and not a protégé of the hellish Governor Misharin. Here’s his picture. Not the Martian, I mean — Misharin:
What is United Russia doing? Exactly what you’d expect: trying to abolish the post of mayor and bring in a city manager. When asked how a city of over a million people can be left without a mayor, they answer: that’s the federal trend. They want to pull this off very quickly: on August 24, an extraordinary session of the Duma was convened (in violation of procedure); public hearings on the proposed amendments to the city charter were scheduled for September 17; and on September 28, the Duma will meet to vote on those amendments. What needs to be done? There is a chance to influence the situation — the law provides for a public-hearing procedure, and without it the Duma cannot amend the charter. Naturally, the crooks scheduled the hearings for a workday, during the day, in a small hall. Because the question of whether the city’s mayor should or should not be elected is apparently so insignificant. So the task for all decent Yekaterinburg residents is to find a way to come to these hearings on September 17 and give the United Russia people a good kicking. And then come to the big citywide rally on September 25. Important links on the subject: Detailed information from the LiveJournal of Yekaterinburg City Duma deputy Leonid Volkov ( leonwolf ) http://leonwolf.livejournal.com/191122.html The relevant LiveJournal community http://community.livejournal.com/pravovibora_ekb/ The relevant VKontakte group http://vkontakte.ru/club18451748 — it seems to already have more than a thousand members How those opposed to changes to the city charter are being prevented from working http://kolezev.livejournal.com/1443143.html How they are preparing to rig these hearings http://mpetlin.livejournal.com/14338.html If your relatives/acquaintances live in Yekaterinburg, please send them this post or any of these links. If you are connected with any online resource in Yekaterinburg, the request is the same — help spread the word. If you happen to run into Governor Misharin or someone from Sverdlovsk Region’s United Russia branch, please give them a smack upside the head. Thank you.