Alexei Navalny’s speech at the opening of the campaign headquarters in Yekaterinburg

Hey, hi everyone.

Listen, you missed the best part.

The most interesting thing. Someone was following me there with an

American flag. And I was even

actually being called some kind of local satanic monster

carrying an American flag, and saying: "You

came here with an American flag."

I said, "Well, you're the one walking behind me with an

American flag." I invited him

here for a debate, it should be interesting. I'm

ready to demonstrate in practice

that these people have

nothing to say to me. Whoever's back there

and says, "That NOD guy came, the one with the

flag"—bring him in here. I promised him

a debate, seriously.

Or maybe to hell with the security bastard?

For now, we can't guarantee his safety.

And now, friends, so, this is the first

campaign office opening where we won't

be able to do without a microphone, and I'll have to

direct you all a little bit somehow,

sorry about that. First of all, we need

a very, very careful and slow step

backward so that at least some people can

actually see something. Carefully, though, because

we don't want everyone crushing each other.

And now one more very careful

as the radius increases, the circumference

gets larger and more people

will be able to see. You can use signs

to ask questions. Or

uh, raise your hand. So, the microphone

will help us manage somehow now. Ah,

Oleg, Ruslan is at the entrance, right,

there are still a lot of people on the stairs. Yes,

well, let them in carefully, just so that

there's no stampede. Of course,

apparently even this room isn't enough.

Yes,

of course it isn't enough.

Ekaterina.

So, if anyone feels stuffy, or soon will

feel stuffy—and you soon will—let's put

your jackets over there on the windowsill, pass them along or something,

otherwise you won't be able to breathe, we

won't be able to breathe, and our meeting

will end in people fainting, and we're not ready

to lose volunteers this early.

But we're ready.

And

Ruslan, then shout from the entrance when

more or less everyone is inside. Okay.

Okay.

And you're here, and Oleg is there.

Oleg, then you shout from the entrance when

more or less everyone is inside. Let's wait 2

minutes and then we'll start.

Pass it along to let Boroda in

here.

But he didn't come.

But he did go

Belous is there.

Ah, well, you promised him.

Let only him in. There's some crazy

old man there now. We don't need the old man.

Let him come in, we won't troll him.

That old man. He used to troll Nemtsov too.

Well then, are we actually

seriously going to go invite him or not?

Seriously, Fet, let him in, let him

seriously, we promised. Come on, corridor

just explain why he's walking around the city

with an American

Belous, go

bring him here

and we'll see.

Oh, Viktor,

the first campaign office opening where we can't

do without a microphone. The first opening

of a campaign office where we had to

give up the traditional procedure

of shaking hands at the entrance, because we

would have spent half an hour doing that. I don't

even know how many people there are—so many—but

later, in any case, with everyone, we'll definitely

so to speak, hug, because otherwise

it just wouldn't be right.

So is Belous coming or what? They'll sell out any minute now.

Start already. We

we're starting to drink. Well, go ahead.

Ah, friends,

good afternoon, Yekaterinburg. Hello, everyone.

It's incredibly nice to be here.

And, as you understand, it's especially

nice for me that in Yekaterinburg we have, uh,

record attendance. And so, by virtue

of being, so to speak, a local guy from Yekaterinburg,

I'll speak for 3 minutes longer than usual. I

usually say just a few words and then hand it over

straight to Alexei. But here, uh, I really

want, first of all—I'm incredibly happy to see

everyone. It's wonderful to see so

many familiar faces, and even more wonderful

to see so many unfamiliar ones. We

can see that this campaign has brought

some new optimism, brought in

some new people.

And we, as a campaign office, are doing everything

possible to make sure that this optimism

is justified, so that we don't let you down. Oh,

I'll explain now, and then

we'll hold the promised debate.

So,

uh, Navalny's campaign.

Right now we have 28,500 registered

volunteers. We also have

more than 130,000 people who, on the website,

left their details and promised to give

their signature in support of Alexei's nomination

as a presidential candidate.

You all know the technical side of this.

Formally, the campaign will begin in mid-

December, and for collecting signatures

the lawmakers have allotted the most convenient time for

gathering signatures: from December 25 to January 20.

And everyone understands that this was done

deliberately. It was done this way in order to

so that no one can prevent these signatures from being collected.

We will make every effort

to make that happen. But for that

to be possible, we need

to know in advance, to meet, to look

each person in the eye, check their passport, and speak with every

person who will come in December and

sign. That is why, already now,

10 months before the start of the campaign,

we are building this entire infrastructure,

opening our headquarters and traveling around the regions.

Our task right now is, first of all,

to set up all of this

organizational work, uh, so that

we can prepare to collect 300,000

signatures, so that on D-Day, whether that is

December 25 or December 28, at our 77

regional headquarters all across the country, in

each one there will be a huge line of

people whose information we have already

verified in advance—that is, we already know these are

real people, and we have checked their

passports against FIAS, KLADR, and all

the databases. They come in, we collect

the signatures—this is our main ironclad

argument, the tool with which we will

fight to get candidates registered.

The second task is to prepare 100,000

observers for all polling stations

across Russia. The third task of the headquarters is,

as you know, campaigning. You came here

primarily because of the third

task. Checking passport data is

pretty boring, and filling out signature sheets

by hand, you know, there

entering everything correctly, like "40 years in

LKSM (Leninist Communist Youth League). Street," and then writing out "forty years"

in words and checking, yes,

comparing it to make sure it appears on the sheet exactly

as it does in the passport—that is even more boring. Everyone

wants to go out into the streets, hand out leaflets,

talk to city residents, and campaign.

Some people are bold, or just interested in it,

and want, I don't know, to go on a

campaigning weekend trip, say, to

Kamensk-Uralsky or somewhere

else. We see all your

requests, we read all your letters, even

if we do not always have time to reply to everything.

And we understand and see all of this. You are here

for the sake of the third of the headquarters' three

tasks: campaigning. But we have to solve

all three: training observers,

collecting signatures, and campaigning. And right now our

first task is to build this entire

support infrastructure. Seventy-seven headquarters. They have

coordinators—where is Viktor? Here is Viktor,

our coordinator in Yekaterinburg. And we are also

holding openings in all the other

cities in order to provide you, our

main force, our main weapon, well,

with everything you need. Because

all kinds of people write to us. Some are 18,

some are older, some are, uh, a little

older. Some are introverts, some are

extroverts, some want to do some kind of

back-office work, some are eager

to get out into the streets and meet people, some

want to hand out leaflets, some

are not ready to hand out leaflets on the street,

for example, say, the head of a homeowners' association

and wants to distribute

some leaflets in their building, talk with

neighbors, organize a tea gathering, I don't know,

a campaign event, and talk there. Some people

are ready to devote 15 minutes to the work,

but every day, while others, say, are

extremely busy, but are ready in the summer to take

two weeks of vacation. Today I received

a letter from a guy named Albert Abuzarov,

a real person. He lives in Australia, in

the city of Sydney, and he is originally from Kazan. He

says: "Here in Australia, from June to

August, it's very cold, miserable, and there's nothing

to do. I'm ready to take unpaid leave

for three months in Sydney and fly,

basically, to Kazan." But only if you tell me

what I should do there, so that it will be

useful. And that is the task of the headquarters. The task

of the headquarters is

to create an infrastructure such that

there is a place for everyone. That is, 28,000

volunteers—and soon, I am sure, there will be

50,000 and 100,000 of them. That is an enormous force,

if that force is used properly and intelligently.

If a person who

comes for 15 minutes, or comes for a whole day,

or wants to work from home, or is

the head of a homeowners' association, or has

a car, or has, I don't know,

a shop where they are ready to put up stickers,

they are all different. And our task

is that whoever comes to us, no matter

how different they may be, we can tell them:

"Man, for you, the way you can be most

useful is this

way. Here are your instructions. Here is a

step-by-step algorithm. This is what you need to do, and

how you need to do it, when you will bring

the greatest benefit. Because everything

people ask us—it is incredibly gratifying for us to hear—

is: "How can we

be most useful?" And it is precisely

with that in mind that we are trying

to organize our work with you. But what

must be understood is that the country is very large,

and building this infrastructure really

takes time. And so I want to say right away

that you need to be a little

patient. Until June, we will be

traveling across the country, opening more and more

headquarters. And in those already open, we will gradually

create more and more of these

support options so that, say, by

summer, when it is warm and

clean outside, in Yekaterinburg, when it is

warm, so that we can, uh,

so that by summer we can, uh, for each person

to provide some tools, say,

for street campaigning. And everyone went

out to campaign. So if you were to

come to the headquarters right now and say, "Give

me leaflets, assignments, and so on."

We would most likely say, "Friends, right

now we're not quite ready yet, yes, we've only just

opened, we're getting set up, not all of you

can fit onto the staff, but we'll gradually get all this

done, including with your help,

thanks to your feedback and so

on."

Thank you very much, friends. As you've just

seen, for now the main difficulty

of the election campaign is

taking the microphone away from Volkov. That doesn't always

work out easily. This isn't my first time in

Yekaterinburg. I'm tremendously happy to be here.

I'm very glad, very happy, to see you.

I love this city. And by the way,

they prepared several briefing notes for me.

And in every one of them it said that

the first thing I'd be asking about

would be the mud.

That's probably the main disappointment,

because I didn't see any of it. They even

ask about it—we had a funny incident,

where you ask a taxi driver, "So where's the

mud?" And in this almost apologetic

tone he says, "Oh, it's there, it's there, you just

got unlucky. Wait, we'll find some in the center,

we'll show you." Ah, what a great city—I love you all.

Ah, and one important thing: I spoke about this today

at the press conference—my

work would be impossible without you

always, whatever I do, Yekaterinburg

ranks third after Moscow and St. Petersburg in

site visits, video views,

donations, volunteers—across the board,

thank you so much, guys.

It's also expected that I'll deliver some

kind of fiery speech to you. But when

we were leaving the headquarters, you—

your name is

Ilya Belous.

And Ilya Belous accompanied me from the headquarters

to here, carrying an American flag behind me, and

he was saying to me, "Navalny, get out of here,

leave Yekaterinburg. Why did you come? This is

not your city, it's our city." So,

it seems to me it would be right for us to

have a short debate with Ilya. And I

will answer his question about why I came to

Yekaterinburg.

And I'll start with that, then I'll speak for myself,

well, like, I don't know, some kind of battle, I guess.

That is, I'll just use ordinary words. Then

I'll give you the floor, then maybe

a couple of questions. Dear Ilya, Comrade

Ilya, I came to Yekaterinburg

well, because I see people, because

I do not believe

that the country's third most industrially powerful city

should be treated with contempt, the way it

is despised by the Kremlin. Because this

city once had a bicameral parliament

at one point. In this city they elected a mayor who was not

your United Russia man, but someone else.

This city belongs to a different tradition—of free, honest

politics and political life. And I

very much want politics to return

to Yekaterinburg, so that

Yekaterinburg's voice can be heard. So that not four

crooks in the Kremlin make the decisions, but the people of Yekaterinburg

as well. Because do you think

politics should work like this? That I

just go see Putin, chat things over,

make a deal or fail to make one, and then either get in

or not? I believe instead that I should

travel to cities, speak to

people, win their support, and only after

that go anywhere. Do you agree with that

position?

Yes.

Yes.

That's probably why I have the right to come

to Yekaterinburg. I came here, Ilya, to

Yekaterinburg because you were walking behind me

with an American flag. But with an American

flag, or the flag of the Cayman Islands,

or the flag of Bermuda, you should be following

your Ural oligarchs, because

all the raw materials, all the extractive enterprises

belong to damn offshore companies. They don't even

belong to a Russian legal entity of the

oligarch—they've moved everything under foreign

flags.

He pays taxes there, while here—do you

know how much a molder earns at

Uralvagonzavod? 30,000 rubles.

For someone doing hard labor. Is that normal

or not?

That's a lot.

That's a lot.

Overstated.

And I came here because I do not want

to hear the answer, "That's a lot," because

that's poverty. I know that people in an

industrial center should be earning

at least 80,000 rubles here. And the average

salary here should be 120,000, because

people here work, and they are being robbed,

Ilya, by the very people you are defending for some reason.

I came here, Ilya, because, well,

I have a lot in common with these people.

In particular, we do not agree that

the country's deputy prime minister

should be flying dogs around on a plane. Do you

agree with that?

I don't.

You don't agree with that? Do you

agree with that?

No. Perhaps Ilya will vote for me

if he sees more of my investigations,

but you see, I publish these

investigations, I present irrefutable

facts showing that the deputy prime minister

of the Russian government, whom you freely

or unwittingly defend, is

a corrupt official and robbed them, robbed

me, robbed you. And I want to remove him.

Yes, I want to overthrow the power

of people who fly their dogs on private jets.

I’m probably not the only one in Russia. And I

am sure that the support for me on this

issue will be greater than 86%.

I, Ilya, came here because, well, I

want people to see those in power, so that

they could see their wives, children, and sons-in-law.

Where is Yulia Navalnaya? Everyone can, on this, but

raise your hand higher.

Everyone can already see my wife. Everyone.

They can find out which school my

children attend. Your NTV channel films them with hidden

cameras when they go somewhere. I don’t

like it. Well, okay, that’s the burden

of being a public politician. And I want

public politics in Russia to be such that

we at least roughly understand who the wife

of the president is, so that we at least roughly

understand why his daughter ended up

receiving hundreds of millions of rubles,

billions of rubles in state contracts.

Well, tell me, please, are you interested in

why the youngest billionaire in

Russia became Kirill Shamalov, Putin’s son-in-law?

Are you interested?

I’m interested too. And I think that in Russia

there are quite a lot of people who are

interested in this, who are looking for their own answers. And

I came here in order to rely

on these people and, together with them, keep

traveling to Tyumen, Kurgan, and Moscow.

These are real people. Who sent money

to the campaign?

You’ll ask me who is financing it—

the State Department, McCain? Well, here they are. There’s your

McCain, there’s the State Department, right there. I can see Trump

behind— I have people I can point to, Ilya.

I have people to show you—real, living

people,

who want real politics.

So whether you like it or not,

whether Roldugin, Rotenberg, or Shuvalov like it or not,

but I came to

Yekaterinburg and I’ll come again. And we now have

640 volunteers now; there will be 2,800,

and we will keep building our support

until we win, because we are right.

Thank you very much. Now I’m handing you the

microphone.

Hello, everyone present. Uh,

of course, on the one hand, it’s hard

to speak before an audience that is

completely against you.

Yes, we’re for you too.

Alexei, for you. But

don’t interrupt.

But first of all, I’m surprised, and as an opponent

I’d like to give credit—Mikhail

Kasyanov, for example, Mikhail Kasyanov,

wouldn’t have gone for this. That is, Mikhail—

but we weren’t able to ask him direct questions.

So in that respect, I give you

credit. Now, second.

I’m even a little at a loss for what to say. Did I

understand correctly that you have completely

changed your liberal political

concept? And if you become president

of the Russian Federation, will you announce

nationalization in favor of the state

of what

the oligarchs grabbed back when I

was, say, in school, yes,

in the 1990s, during privatization? You’re now

saying that a great many

means of production belong

to some private individuals, yes, to some

private oligarchs who take this money

offshore. But this system

took shape under Boris Nikolayevich (Boris Yeltsin).

That was when most of the economy

passed into private hands. And somehow

it turned out that all the

manufacturing was destroyed, while all the

extractive industries remained in their hands, and

complex products began to be produced abroad

and supplied to us from there. That

is, the main margin is generated there on

complex goods, while we earn

only on resources, yes, on oil,

gas, and so on. That’s wrong. Do I

understand correctly that you have changed your

liberal views to views of

protectionism?

Don’t call these liberal views.

Someone misled you, Ilya. All my life

I’ve stood for this. I’ll answer now.

And

Russia does not need nationalization.

Russia needs property to be taken away from

crooks. Because formally, the company

Rosneft belongs to whom?

The state.

The state. If I ask you or

anyone in this audience, any

business journalist, to whom they sold

19% of Rosneft’s shares recently, they will all

say: "We don’t know."

And

and that is the wrong situation. We, well,

right now the company has been handed over to Sechin, who

bought himself a yacht, who bought himself a house

for a billion rubles, and so on. We need

to make it so that the authorities

nationalize and take property from

the mafia, Ilya. The mafia, the bandits, seized it

in small numbers, and you know their names:

the Rotenbergs, Roldugin, excuse me,

Putin. Because right now you have—well, I’ll

answer.

All of this happened under Yeltsin. Have you been to

the Yeltsin Center?

I’ve been to the Yeltsin Center. There are photos there

of the great people who did all this,

working in the Kremlin since 1991 or

since 1996. Their names are

Anatoly Borisovich Chubais and Vladimir

Vladimirovich Putin, who worked in

the Presidential Control Directorate since

1996. What

happened in the country in the 1990s

was done by the people who are now

sitting in the Kremlin. No matter what rally I go to,

there is always your picket line there. Well, not yours,

but your colleagues', or, I don't know,

just people who don't like me. And

they all blame me for Chubais. And I have

just one question: blame Putin. I debated with

Chubais the same way I am debating with

you. I demand Chubais's resignation. I

demand an investigation into corruption in Rus

Hydro and in Rusnano. Why doesn't Putin do that?

Why doesn't he do it?

That is why nationalization should be directed there,

at this mafia-like group. And please,

tell me,

are you ready to support a presidential candidate

who clearly says that he

will return to Russia, to the people of Russia,

the national resource rent? He will make sure

that Russia is not just a raw-material appendage.

And you are wrong here when you say that

Yeltsin did this. Sixty percent of the federal

budget now comes from the sale of oil and

gas. In Soviet times, your favorite period,

that was not the case. Putin did this over 17 years.

Are you ready, are you not afraid

to stand up against the authorities in support of

a candidate who will actually return

the national wealth to everyone, including

you?

What I wanted to begin with, Alexei, is that

you are manipulating the numbers again.

First of all,

the fact is that half of the Russian

budget is indeed filled by

revenues from oil exports. But

the Russian budget—that is, what

the state spends on social welfare, on

the army, border protection, and so on—is

not the whole Russian economy. Of the entire

Russian economy, oil and gas revenues

account for 17% of the total. The rest comes from

other types of production. That's the first point.

Second. What surprises me is that the phenomenon of

Alexei Navalny emerged

at the moment when our leadership gained

independence from the West. No one

will deny today that during

the Yeltsin years our state was not independent

in foreign policy, in

ideological policy, in education policy,

and in many other areas

decisions were made that were

beneficial only to state

competitors, but in no way to

the Russian people. In the 1990s we

lived very badly. People were hungry, it was cold

in the streets,

one second.

There was shooting in the streets.

Since then, life has changed dramatically.

Over 17 years

people have definitely started living better. Yesterday

interr.

People live better than they did in the 1990s.

That is beyond doubt. That is why there is such support.

Did you hear that a grenade was detonated yesterday?

Your,

Alexei,

let's not get sidetracked.

At this point, most people

live stable lives and are confident about tomorrow

and about their safety.

Compared with the 1990s, absolutely.

Absolutely.

Quiet.

One second.

[inaudible].

Next.

listen. It's really hard for him when all of this

this

go on, Alexei, speak.

You find corruption only among those

people who are currently carrying out

state policy. That is, you

never talked about the corruption of Nikita

Belykh or Ulyukayev or other people

who helped implement liberal

policies. That is why your, your fight against

corruption is more like a kind of

political contract killing. Whoever does not

suit you, you remove them. And, you see,

you appeared, but you are not

an independent figure.

You do not have support among the population

of the Russian Federation. All these people here

who support you may be many,

but in those cases when you took part in

elections, it was 1–2%.

Now, funding. Your funding

comes from abroad, from

American foundations supporting

democracy, from the Republican

Institute of McCain. When you come

to various election campaigns, you

immediately meet with American

diplomats.

So I want to say that you are not

an independent figure. You are

the equivalent of Saakashvili, the equivalent of Poroshenko. That is,

you are the person who, according to the plan of

the Western intelligence services, with which you are

connected, is supposed to implement a policy of

an American protectorate over our

country—that is, political occupation.

You are calling for a change of power, uh, let's

look: in recent years, these

same kinds of liberal politicians like you,

for freedom, supported by the United

States—where have they actually made things better?

The Arab Spring happened—what stability is there

there? What is there, Navalny?

The Maidan happened in Ukraine, right? Did people end up better off

when the government changed?

Do you understand? That’s why everything you say

about changing the government is very unconvincing.

And I’ll repeat: you are not

an independent force. And that is exactly

why we are here today, because overall

I’m not some kind of professional

politician or activist. I have

an ordinary job, an ordinary life. But when

rallies like yours take place,

we show up. Ordinary residents. You asked

me to say where I work.

I work at a private company,

uh, on developing a project

for a transport interchange hub in

our city.

What company?

So, I work on

designing infrastructure facilities.

As for my education, I am a teacher

of the history of the English language. Interesting.

So, what I would like to say is

why we express our protest every

time against you and your supporters. Because

we do not consider you an independent force.

If you come to power, you will

carry out policies like those of

Saakashvili, Poroshenko, like

And what makes you think that? And

I’ve simply been studying color-revolution

techniques and the people who

carry them out for quite a long time. And I understand perfectly well

what will happen if at the head of the country there is

a person who was created, cultivated,

and promoted by the West. I understand perfectly well

what your goal is. Wait, let me

please speak. I maintain that you

understand that in the election you will not

be the winner,

but your goal in 2018

is to say: "I was pressured, I wasn’t allowed

to run. The elections are unfair, we do not

recognize them." So everyone, please,

grab some tea, a good mood, and head to

Bolotnaya (Bolotnaya Square in Moscow, associated with protest rallies). These actions are clear to anyone who

studies color-revolution techniques. And that is exactly what I do

precisely as a publicist, as a

researcher. In other words, I work not

only on the street. Accordingly, I

maintain that your task is

to destabilize the situation. I do not want

for us here in the Urals to have

some kind of Poroshenko-style ATO (the Ukrainian government’s term for its “anti-terrorist operation”), or

a revival of Bandera or Vlasov (figures associated in Russia with nationalism and collaboration). In other words,

all that stuff we hear on TV every day.

So am I right in understanding that you

support my taking part in

the election?

I support having people in the election

who want to make

the country better, not people who were

planted here by the West.

As I understand it, there is a high probability

a very high probability that after all I

will get Ilya’s vote and those of his colleagues, because

everything he says—well, either he

just made it up on the spot, or he

has simply been brainwashed, because everything

you said is absolutely either

untrue, or you are describing your own

Putin and your own oligarchs with offshore accounts

while somehow calling it me. You say that

Ulyukayev is a liberal politician. Putin appointed him.

And all this

Kudrin, a liberal politician, whom you are against—

Putin appointed Kudrin too.

And Russia’s wealth is being seized

by foreigners. These are people with foreign

citizenship who have acquired

virtually everything here. They have foreign

citizenship, while I live, excuse me, in

the Maryino district. And my children go to

a Moscow school. And my wife lives here

in Moscow, you understand, unlike the children

of Putin, the children of Lavrov, and the children of all

the others. It’s Rotenberg who has Finnish

citizenship, you understand? You are defending

not me, a Russian man with Russian

citizenship—on the contrary, rather, you are defending

Rotenberg the Finn from me and from them, people

with Russian citizenship. Ilya, everything

you said is a bundle of clichés.

McCain, Saakashvili, the Orange

Revolution. What does any of this have to do with

me? I came to say one simple thing

to you, guys: let’s fix the traffic jams and

the roads in Yekaterinburg.

I came to tell you, guys, that in 2011

Yekaterinburg’s budget was 31 billion

rubles.

36. Thank you, Leonid. And now it’s 31. That

means it has decreased over 4 years. And our

question is simple: why not

send the money here instead of handing it over

to the damn Rotenbergs, Kovalchuks, and

everyone else? That’s exactly it. We are fighting

for what you yourselves claim to support.

That is what a national liberation

movement really is. What you see is that they want

to free our country from the yoke of oligarchs,

from the yoke of offshore business, from

this corporate crap where

everything is run by four people. You

accuse me of being some kind of

Maidan, but it was Putin who carried out a

coup d’état. He has been ruling

the country like an absolute monarch for 17

years already. In the 21st century, we have created in Russia

an absolute monarchy.

These people took away from us, from you, from

the city its powers to approve

rallies, to approve advertising, and over

urban planning policy. You will not

be able to implement these

things you’ve drawn up there, yes, for that

transport hub, because the city of

Yekaterinburg has been stripped of the right to regulate

urban development. And my

struggle, Ilya, is for your sake. Maybe

even more for your sake

than for theirs, because they understand

a lot, while your head has been filled with nonsense. You

with this militarized style of yours, you

put on camouflage pants and everything

else. And I’m telling you that, well,

the Admiral Kuznetsov sailed there and back.

That cost 7 billion rubles. For 7 billion rubles,

you could build two top-class

hospitals here and provide free

cancer surgeries to everyone who needs them

in Sverdlovsk Region. That’s what I’m fighting for.

If you think I’m doing this on the orders of

McCain, well, you can

think that, but I believe I’m doing it at the urging of

those people who write to me:

"Lyosha,

I’m a retired serviceman, and they put me on a

waiting list; I have stage-two cancer,

in six months it will be

stage four." No one can get me the surgery

I need. And I realize that, well,

for heaven’s sake, we sold $3 trillion worth of oil and gas

over the past years.

Why can’t we provide a free

operation for a person? That, Ilya, is our

struggle. I already told

journalists today, and I’m telling you, and I’m telling

everyone: I will be an excellent president for

you. Because unlike Putin, I

will give you the opportunity to take part in

politics. I will give people the opportunity to participate

in politics, from you all the way to

Strelkov, who was running around somewhere in

Ukraine, fighting, and now he’s been pushed out

from everywhere. He walks around in a bulletproof vest.

They have eliminated all parties. Your

party was eliminated when

what’s the name of that crook on Channel Two?

Ah, right, Kiselyov calls you

something like feeble-minded there and insults your

movement.

I’ll throw him out.

But never...

You’re not... All right. But it seemed to me

that it was a NOD picket.

I will ban people like Kiselyov from being

on television, insulting and abusing

other people. I will allow a free point

of view. You will come to a free

radio station, and I will come too. You probably

don’t object, I assume,

to these people coming to polling

stations and voting. Probably not.

So it’s simple. You have

your set of views, which are wrong.

You’ve been deceived. We have our own set of

views. We will come to the elections, and in those

elections we will face off. And I have no doubt

about our victory, our victory, because

historically this regime is doomed,

because it truly is

anti-Russian, against Russia and Russians, if

you like. And

shall we give you 2 more minutes for a reply or

response? Let’s give Ilya 2 more minutes.

Thank you very much. Another 2 minutes. Not a second more.

So,

Alexei, first of all, once again

you’re manipulating the numbers. It’s very hard to debate

when I’m apparently McCain’s man,

when the words are based on sheer populism.

Any person here—I hope many

of the students present here

have studied the history of the Russian Empire,

Russia, and know the importance of the Middle

East, the Caucasus, and Syria in our history.

And the destabilization there began in order

to prevent Gazprom from routing our

pipeline to Europe, so that we could not, so that

we could not make money from gas.

And the U.S. objective is for their pipeline to run from Qatar,

controlled by them.

These are geopolitical objectives. Alexei,

there is a defense budget. Alexei, you know

that there is a defense budget,

at different times it amounts to around 3–4%, right?

The operation in Syria fits within that

budget.

And this isn’t money taken from kindergartens; these funds were allocated from the start.

If you became president,

you would approve the budget item by item, as

is normally done.

I wouldn’t rebuild Palmyra; I would

rebuild Yekaterinburg.

So you too would give up on

the foreign interests of the Russian Federation.

That’s right—

foreign policy interests

do exist for Russia. So, the main

main external, internal, whatever kind of

political interest Russia has is

for its people to live more prosperously. Russia’s economy is

1.5% of the global economy. When

a worker at Uralvagonzavod (a major Russian railcar and tank manufacturer) is earning

90,000 rubles, then I’ll think about

spending a single kopek on restoring

Palmyra. But only after that, when

we’re driving on decent roads, when

we’ve treated all our people, when we are

living more prosperously—that is the first step toward

Russia’s international standing. Ilya,

thank you very much for being here with us.

Well, I hope we entertained you

a little.

All right. And I’m ready to answer questions

from the audience and from Leonid. All the best, everyone.

Ah, thank you very much.

In fact, we have just witnessed

something fairly unique, yes, because

most often these people simply

have nothing to say. Well yes, Ilya came,

good for him, a very good and brave man,

but will the governor

come? No.

He’s in the region.

He can't speak properly.

We did invite them. We invited everyone. None of

them will ever come, because

they have nothing substantive to object with,

because all they can

say is, well, we know about you,

the Orange Revolution, McCain, blah blah blah

and everything else. Every time we

get to the point of saying, guys, let's

spend money on ourselves, on our own people,

they have nothing to say. And so,

Alexei, may I ask something? Alexei,

In a second, in a second, wait, I'll get to it,

we'll move on to questions in a moment. I'm

already wrapping up. It's just that what

happened is very important, yes,

and I want you to be volunteers in this

campaign with an understanding of one crucial thing. We

are the majority.

The moral right is on our side on

every item on the agenda; the public

will always support us. We have 86%, while

all the percentages they have,

exist simply because they keep saying it

on television endlessly, and people

don't know anything. So I hope that,

with your support, we will break this breach in

the censorship and get what rightfully belongs to us.

And what rightfully belongs to us

is indeed the majority in

our country. Historically, these people

are doomed,

but we are not. The future belongs to us.

Thank you very much. Ready for questions?

Let's do it in an orderly way. Yes.

Alexei.

May I?

Alexei

Do you want a microphone? Why don't you go first,

you, and then

otherwise there'll be pushing and shoving. Just speak from where you are,

and Alexei will repeat it into the microphone

for you, because otherwise everyone here will get

crushed.

Look, over the past year you've started building

your own system and campaigning actively across

Russia. But do you understand that the country—

that the authorities—won't just give up like that,

even if you have—look how many people are here,

how many of your

supporters there are—do you understand that the authorities

won't simply hand it over? And your...

I understand the question. I'll repeat it. The question

is as follows: you've already done a lot,

but you understand that the authorities

won't just hand over power, and that they

will resist. Yes,

Well, listen, I think about Shuvalov

and I wonder, will he voluntarily agree

to give up his billions and his airplane

with his corgis on board? Hmm, let's think,

will he or won't he? No. Will

Sechin give up his yacht?

Probably not. Will Putin's

friend Roldugin

stop taking $2 billion for himself and saying,

that he spent it on musical

instruments? Of course not. But that doesn't

matter. Of course, they will never

give up anything voluntarily, because

that would mean they would have to

give up billions of dollars and

power in the largest country in the world. Listen,

these are just petty crooks from

the St. Petersburg mayor's office, and at your Yeltsin Center

it's brilliantly described how they accidentally

ended up in that office. I mean, they were just

some people trading,

dealing a bit in non-ferrous metals, well,

third-rate swindlers who wound up in

the Kremlin, and now they are at the head of a nuclear

state, the largest country in the world,

of course they won't give it up. But then the question

for us is: "So are we going to give up our rights

because of that?"

No.

Are you going to give up something because

Shuvalov's little dogs are so expensive?

No.

And there are more of us, many more of us. But that's how

any authoritarian country works.

From Zimbabwe to Belarus and Kazakhstan.

They don't give up. And we won't

give up either. Whoever is more persistent

will win. I look at you and understand

that we will be persistent.

Listen, but they've dragged you through the courts.

Do you understand that they could bring

a case against you?

All right, they've dragged me through the courts. So

what? Have they dragged you through the courts?

Thank God. Great. Well, that's

the division of labor. I go through the courts, and

you take a flyer and go around your apartment building, and

that's it. And no one can ever be completely cornered.

That's how it works. So, there was

a question from the back there, and you—

yes, yes, please.

I travel around the country and talk to

different people, and very few support you.

Do you know why? They ask what

Alexei has actually done, what he's done in real terms.

You know, when an election

campaign is underway and a United Russia deputy, or

someone running from United Russia, can

put his own money into some

tangible things—put windows in someone's building,

or build a playground. But what

do we do?

Hand out a kilogram of potatoes. Okay, I

understand the question. I'll say it again: Putin,

fine, stability, let's keep earning

30,000 rubles, because supposedly otherwise

it can't be any different. And the task of an election

campaign is to explain that it can

be different, it will be different, and it should

be different. And we will be able to convince everyone,

there's a sign there

A question about education.

Good salaries are, of course, all well and good,

that’s fine. But look, 70% of students after

graduating from university do not work in

the field they studied. Do you have a program

for changing education?

The question was actually this: 70%

of students after university do not work, do not

work in their specialty.

Do you have a program in the area of

education? Well, that’s not connected with

education.

In other words, you got a good education,

and the fact that you can’t work in

your specialty simply means that

the ugly monopolistic structure

of the economy gives you nowhere to find a job.

In Yekaterinburg, for example, this is easier

to talk about, because here you have a superb

mathematical school of your own. Two

major universities, a huge number of

programmers. And where do large numbers of them go?

Abroad, because here

there is simply nowhere to work in their field.

Nowhere at all. And this is a matter of economics and

politics, because right now the whole country

has basically turned into a pipeline

through which oil and gas flow. Even if

Belousov said it was 17%, that’s not

true. The federal budget is 60%, and everything

else is still derivative

of raw materials. So in reality,

this state doesn’t need anyone, no one

is needed. They need guys who

pull black liquid out of the ground,

haul it to the border, guard it,

and then work as stewards on their

yachts. That’s all. This is not a question of

education. We will change all of this, and we

will create enterprises where people with

different kinds of education will be

in demand. Yes. Next question.

Alexei, one more question about higher education. Right now

it is structured in such a way that

students in the humanities

get far fewer state-funded places

than technical students. So the first

question is: is this some kind of deliberate

state policy, to give more to tech students

than to humanities students? And second,

when you become president, will this

change, and will it mean...

Right, the question is really about

education again. Why do people in

the humanities get

more than those in technical fields?

No, state-funded places,

state-funded places.

Places.

An excellent question for a lawyer with a humanities

education. Well, listen, I watched this

back in the 1990s, and in

the 1990s nobody wanted—everyone

wanted to be lawyers or economists,

because it was assumed that lawyers

and economists would earn a lot, while everyone

else would earn next to nothing.

Now, in fact, this has changed. And

the most in-demand people, as I understand it, are

those in physics, engineering, math, that sort of thing. But

again, the answer is roughly the same.

Our education system is disconnected. It

does something on its own, chewing through

budget money. It has no connection to

the real needs of the labor market.

For example, take

programmers: there seem to be a lot of them among

our volunteers, and

Volkov is still almost obsessively looking for programmers

for the campaign, and still

can’t find them. There is simply a

global imbalance, and it is connected first and foremost

with the fact that the state

controls 86% of the economy, and the state

devours any commercial sector.

There is practically no small business. And, well,

that leads to this situation where, I don’t know, one day they

decide that if tomorrow some state giant decides to hire

humanities graduates, then humanities graduates will be everywhere.

If tomorrow they decide on tech specialists, then there will be

tech specialists. But that’s not how it should work.

The market should regulate these things, as

it does all over the world. And in Russia it will

regulate them too, once we finally at least

partly overcome the monopolization

of the economy. Next question.

I have a question. I came here with

my classmates, and one of my

Don’t shout, I’ll repeat it.

One of my classmates said that

she told her father at home that she

was going to come meet you. Her father

replied: “To Navalny? How can you

go to him? He’s just like Poroshenko.” And you know,

there are a lot of people like that in the country,

really a whole category of them. So I

want to ask how you plan

to work with people like that, given that

you get no airtime on television?

Excellent question. So your acquaintance, your

friend, told her father that she wanted

to go to a meeting with Navalny. And what

did her dad say? “He’s just like Poroshenko, how

can you go? It’s awful, a nightmare,” and so

on. And the answer to this question is, in

fact, the key thing. For everyone

gathered here, for the campaign staff. We conducted

focus groups across the country, and in

Yekaterinburg we held, what, two or

three?

All right, five.

Anyway, we did a lot of what are called

qualitative sociological

studies, because our question was exactly this:

how do we convince dad that

I’m not Poroshenko? How do we prove that

we’re not camels?

And an astonishing thing came out of it. As you

What do you think is the main source,

well, of the formation of political

the source of news for shaping

political views?

Television.

Not in first place. What else? What are the

options?

Radio.

People.

The refrigerator. Maybe the newspaper?

There. I just heard the right answer.

Word of mouth, or something like that. So,

relatives are the most important source, in first

place by a wide margin in terms of

credibility and everything else. Everyone says:

"I have this one acquaintance who

explains everything to me."

So the power of that acquaintance, the power

of a daughter, the power of your acquaintance in

relation to her father, is a million times stronger

than television,

than Kiselyov, Solovyov, and all the rest.

Become that very acquaintance who

brings this news to everyone else. And

even despite the fact that in response you will

hear about Poroshenko, the Maidan, Saakashvili,

all the things that were being said here by

our bearded friend,

your dad will keep talking about Poroshenko and the Maidan

right up until the very last moment, and then

when election day comes, he’ll go and vote for

me. That’s how it works. That is exactly how

it works. You will always persuade your

acquaintance. That is the most powerful thing. Yes,

A question. I work in construction.

For three years now, there has been a downturn in mortgages and in

construction. We are launching new

housing projects. Yekaterinburg is simply stopping

building new housing. And the situation over the

next two years, well, is not going to

change at all.

People have no money.

Of course people have no money. The question is, well,

We can’t get any money.

This person works in construction and

sees that there is a downturn in

construction and mortgages. Well, in

fact, you can see it yourselves if

you read the newspapers. But how could there not be

a downturn? If for the fourth year

in a row real incomes of the

population have been falling, if the city budget, as I already

said, used to be 36 and is now 31 (billion rubles). So that means

those 36 used to be distributed among

residents, and now 4 billion rubles have just

vanished into thin air—there’s less money. And

even though they talk about inflation at

6%, who among you believes inflation is really 6 or

4%? No one. So unfortunately, these are

important things. Maybe this is also,

well, not exactly a plus for our campaign,

because we do not operate by the

principle of “the worse, the better,” but this is

an excellent example of why this government will

achieve nothing and will no longer be able to

do anything, even if the price of oil

goes back up. In what year did the economy start to decline?

In what year?

2012.

In 2013. In fact, in

2013, when the price of oil was

$120 a barrel, the economy

showed growth of 0.3%

against a forecast of 1.3%. Now it is falling

constantly, and the ruling party’s own government

officially says that 20 years of

stagnation await us. So the truth is

that under this regime, mortgages and

construction will keep declining. They will

keep declining. Just talk to any mayor,

any builder, any

beekeeper, any banker. Everything

is falling, everything is shrinking. So the answer

to the question of how long is simple: until Putin is

overthrown. Sorry for being so blunt. Yes,

please, your question. It is very important for us

that you take part in

the elections. But you are accused of indirectly

helping the current authorities, who

benefit from this?

I’ll repeat it afterward, yes. And how can this actually

work—how, with all the violations,

can you win in elections organized by those in power? And

you are reproached for the fact that you may

legitimize the regime through your

participation, and how will you even secure

participation given, well, the way everything

in the system is set up?

Well, listen, here’s the thing. I respect

people who clearly

stand for a boycott. Boycott everything.

Any participation in elections in this system

is unacceptable, forbidden. I do not

agree with that position, but it does have

a certain logic. Nevertheless, it is

the position of a minority. Until the end of

this election campaign—apparently until the end of

my life—they will keep saying that I

took part in the Moscow mayoral election in order to

help Sobyanin. You took part or

tried to take part, or took part, or took part, or

won, in order to help Putin.

That’s just how conspiracy thinking works.

Because those people themselves have never

done anything independently in their lives.

They do not believe that

someone can do something

on their own. But then again, did I

pay you 200 rubles each to come here? Unfortunately,

no, right? Were public-sector workers forced

to come, herded in? I believe that happens. This may

just be my philosophical belief in

free will. We

nothing is predetermined. Everything can be

changed. I do not believe that I am participating in

any kind of legitimization. I know that I am not,

because I do what

I want. And the only one who can

The ones who can influence me are you. I’ll leave this

meeting, read the reports about the campaign, about the

meeting. If you say there, "Well,

Navalny was talking nonsense 30% of the time," I

will try to speak differently, but this is our

political struggle, and we are waging it for

victory, and this is not delegitimization in any way.

The answer to the question of how you can achieve

participation or victory is also very

simple. There are no complicated schemes

at all. There is you and the ballot,

and that’s it. In reality, the one who will truly win

is the one who persuades half—the larger

half—of the population. That’s all. That’s the whole

secret plan. Relying on

you, relying on the campaign headquarters, I want to convince

more than half the population. When, at the

first stage, they register—they do

conduct polling, you see, they

go by the polling—they will register

that if we don’t allow Navalny onto the

ballot, then in Yekaterinburg the percentage

of dissatisfied people will jump from 23 to 65 and, well,

quite possibly they’ll pour into the streets,

then they’ll put my name on the

ballot. And when we are

the majority, the real majority, we

will win. Only that way, and no other. But I

am absolutely sure that this path, which

may seem primitive

or naive to some people, is the only one, and we

will follow it. Yes. Question.

Education. In 1991, in our city,

when they were just

preparing for the first Congress of People’s

Deputies, there was also the question: let’s

people were saying from the podium, let’s

boycott this first Congress of People’s

Deputies. It’s a sham, the Party will

crush us all, and so on. And I remember

Andrei Sakharov’s speech then, and many

others, including Burbulis, who

said: "Guys, we must

make use of the only

opportunity, because for now this is

the only way to undermine the system

from within." It seems to me that right now we

are at the same point. We need to

undermine the system from within. That’s why going

to the elections is necessary.

Absolutely. Who is in favor of undermining

the system from within?

So, from within and from without. You are absolutely

right. This system needs to be put into

crisis. Well, if we see that there is something they

don’t like, something they fear, that

they are trying to avoid something, then

we need to go and hit that pressure point,

creating a crisis for the system until

it collapses—and it will collapse. Yes,

there was a question here:

"What are you going to do about

the Unified State Exam?"

Damn.

Ah, well, I know that the Unified State Exam isn’t popular

in many places, especially among humanities people, but

nevertheless, I think—I think that

the Unified State Exam, basically as a system, should

be preserved. The problem is that right now

the Unified State Exam in Russia is, well, just some kind of

nonsense. Which region is the top champion in

the Unified State Exam?

Dagestan.

Dagestan, I’m told,

yes. The North Caucasus is our champion in

the Unified State Exam. Well, that just completely nullifies the system

altogether. In other words, it’s impossible to discuss

the usefulness or uselessness of the Unified State Exam when

we know there is a system for falsifying

the exam, involving teachers, children,

parents, ministers, and police officers who

are supposed to oversee it, and so on.

So, uh, the question is really not about the exam, but

about whether we will ever see

anything decent at all in this

sphere. With

the question signs.

People with question signs. Yes,

bring it over here, please.

Yes. Good afternoon, Alexei. Good afternoon

everyone. I want to remind you that recently

there was the anniversary of a very important event.

People of different ages, like us,

all of them, gathered ready to die for their

freedom, which, well, is very

Wait, die for their freedom?

I’m serious, well, freedom has been very much smeared in

our country; at least it is

described, you know, as if Maidan (the Ukrainian protest movement) were

all about destruction. I just want to remind

people that it’s not only us who are fighting,

for example. My question is the following:

there are many people, specifically

in the opposition. There was Boris Nemtsov,

there is Vyacheslav Maltsev. Don’t you think

that this creates a kind of split in the country? Maybe even

into good pieces. That is, decent people

are very ready to vote for you, or for this

or that person. But still, why is there no united

opposition that is for everything good and

against everything bad? The bad part is obvious. And

well, sort of—

Listen, the question of—great

question—why is there no united opposition?"

Damn, I wake up in the morning, look in the

mirror, and ask the question: "Why is there no

united opposition?"

Well, people are different, right? Once we start,

even if we put my close

associates here, I would have many

differences of opinion with them. There is

only one person for you who is

100% aligned with you. That is you yourself. Everyone

else is, first of all, a little

different. They have different views,

different ideas. One wants to become

president, while another wants to get

a few votes by virtue of the fact that

acts as a spoiler for that candidate,

who wants to become president. Let's

be honest: there will be no united opposition.

It doesn't exist anywhere. Even in Syria, where

there is a war, the opposition is completely

fragmented. We have never seen

anywhere, neither during the collapse of the Soviet

Union, nor in Ukraine, nor where there were

Orange Revolutions. We don't see it in the United States either.

Yes, the Democrats are completely divided. In

every election in the U.S., there is always

a Libertarian who takes 2%

from the Democratic Party. And there is always an environmentalist

who takes 1.5% from the Democratic Party. This is

human nature. People compete,

and we will never achieve unity. And my

recipe for dealing with this is fairly

simple. Like all simple

solutions, really.

Having understood that I can reach an agreement with many people,

but not with everyone,

I appeal to you, because, well, in the

end, politics is only

a kind of proxy, right? That is, if I can't

reach an agreement with some apparatchik,

I go one level lower. I rely on

the support of the people. That's why I'm not afraid of

primaries or any competitive procedures,

because, well, in order to win

a primary, I don't need to make deals with anyone.

I'll come here, to you,

speak, and try to persuade you

to support me. Only in this way,

that is, only a direct appeal

to the people will help build here, uh,

some semblance of a united opposition. A lot of

questions. Let's take some more. Let's

have the sign. Yes. Well,

Look, let's suppose

we imagine this. Navalny is president

of the Russian Federation — now that's a nice

thought for 2018.

Everything in Russia is great, everything is fine.

But what should be done about Crimea?

At first, before this question

was asked, I somehow felt that

something was off. Damn, something was missing.

The Crimea question.

Uh,

Well, what should be done about the Golan Heights?

What should be done about Northern Cyprus? What should be done

about the Falkland Islands? Ah, and what should be done

about the northern Kuril Islands?

Suffer. Yes.

In other words, these are unresolvable

territorial conflicts that even

civilized

states like Argentina and the United Kingdom cannot resolve.

They are unresolvable. This is, in fact,

a kind of historical crime by Putin

against the country as a whole, because, well,

the legacy will be a hostile, clearly

hostile huge country, the largest

European country aside from Russia, with

a population of 45 million people. It will again

in the foreseeable future be sharply

against us, will vote against us,

work against us there, fight against

us, and Crimea too, for decades — but

it will not be recognized properly by anyone,

and it will not be able to develop normally.

Everyone will suffer. There is no visible solution

to this problem, just as, well, we

do not seriously believe that the problem of

the Palestinian territories is solvable in the

foreseeable future — well, we don't, and Crimea,

unfortunately, is the same. It will remain

with us forever in this form. Yes,

go ahead.

I myself am a student, studying

information systems technology

in subsoil use,

so I'm the kind of person who at the same time

is involved in extraction and is also among those

who want to get out of the country.

I have to repeat that. This is the kind of

person introducing himself as someone who

studies subsoil use and, uh, on the one

hand, information systems

for subsoil use — he extracts oil, but

at the same time wants to leave.