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

Just not together. Hi.

Thank you.

Yes, please.

Thank you so much for coming. Look,

there's some space over there. Come through from there

to here. Closer to the walls. You can fit.

Please let me through as well. Well,

please, please, please.

Thank you so much. So much food. Thank you

so much, guys.

It's a little cramped, and I apologize

for that, but Tula broke Tambov's record today

If you followed it, yesterday in Tambov

we were turned down by 17 venues. How many venues here

refused us?

28.

28. We went through every venue in the city

where we could have fit, and they, uh, and

everywhere they sent in some kind of

police officers, FSB agents, and had our

rental agreements terminated. Yesterday evening

we arranged the hall next door, and it was already

a done deal, and the fearless landlords

said, "We're not afraid of anyone." And

then this morning—sorry, no.

And I'm always very curious—well,

what exactly is the plan here? So, there's a meeting

with your governor, Dyumin. And they

say, "We'll push them out of every venue

and that way we'll solve the problem

of corruption. We'll solve the issue that

people here are outraged. So, did they solve

the problem or not?"

No.

No.

Well, how's that? Have you stopped caring about

the problem of corruption?

No.

Exactly. That's the point. We can talk about this

anywhere. You've seen it—I

spoke in a clearing, I spoke standing

on a bench, on a snowdrift, I spoke in

Barnaul. It's really not a problem. As long

as there are people who are concerned about

these things, then probably someone

will come to a meeting with me. So first of all,

I want to welcome you

for coming here

on a Saturday instead of sleeping and

thinking about school,

It's already the Unified State Exam, so not school, right? And,

by the way, speaking of school. Just

the day before yesterday, Russia's education minister

said that, well, schoolchildren

first of all, shouldn't go to rallies.

Second, they conducted a survey and say

that schoolchildren don't even understand what

corruption is. This is a perfect example

of how the authorities basically

see this. They think that we—

schoolchildren, especially upperclassmen—

are just foolish kids. And that we can be

manipulated with the simplest tricks and

deceived by simply saying, "Come on, guys,

you don't understand what corruption is."

What little fools—you'll believe any song they sing to you."

And so, supposedly, we'd just go away. But

we understand everything. We understand perfectly well

that one of the reasons why, for example,

your governor is so specifically worried

about our meeting, so worried

about possible

rallies, is that the guy has

an apartment worth how many millions,

remind me,

700 million rubles. And really, our

election campaign—you are all volunteers

for the campaign here, thank you

very much. It's exactly about the fact that we

refuse to think of ourselves as servants of this

government. We are not subordinates of the

governor, right?

Yes. Yes.

He is our subordinate, because

he is paid with our money. And our

campaign is about the fact that there are

enough people in this country who

believe they have the right to ask

a governor, a public official: "Man,

just explain your apartment. Explain

it to all of us. How exactly does a 333 sq. m apartment and 700 million

rubles fit with the fact that you, a government official, have spent your whole

life working in public

service? Well, maybe we can give

governors apartments like that, or gift them

them, or something—if the average salary

of ordinary citizens in Tula Region

were 1 million rubles a month. Does anyone

here make 1 million rubles

a month? I'll bring the donation slip for the

campaign right away. Nobody does,

but he has an apartment like that. And all

we want to know right now—we're not

taking it away from him, we're not even dragging him to

jail or anything. We're saying:

"Man, just explain it, please. We're

citizens of this country. The Constitution

says that power belongs to us."

Just explain it. At least come out and say

something like, I don't know, "For medical

reasons. In my previous 150 sq. m apartment

it was very stuffy, I suffered. And

so the doctor prescribed me a 333 sq. m apartment.

For medical reasons." But

say something, at least. But they completely

ignore us. And who expressed their attitude to any of our

questions perfectly? Our

Russian Jabba, Alisher Usmanov.

"Shame on all of you." He says, "Well, what

is it then?" Like, just explain something

at least. He thought and thought, and then said, "Phooey on

you all once again."

Well, we're not okay with that at all. We,

of course, laugh. These are funny

things happening. There are lots of memes,

all kinds of funny stuff. But in essence

it's insulting.

And we understand, well, that everyone is behind us, yes,

they don’t show us on television, they don’t

let us on the radio, but these points of our

platform about fighting corruption, about our

right to ask officials questions

are supported by everyone.

On any website, I don’t know, if you have

some kind of portal where the most

pro-Putin people hang out, I don’t know, where

whoever, some really

hardcore fanatics are—just go there,

set up a poll. Do you think

Governor Dyumin should explain something

about his apartment? And

90% of people there will say: "Yes, we do." That’s

what we need to remember, what we need to understand:

the part of our platform

that concerns fighting corruption

is shared by absolutely everyone.

And there are lots of people whose brains have been washed by

propaganda, who of course, if it says

Navalny, will say:

"Navalny, he stole all the timber, and then

he was a foreign agent. And it’s unclear

which came first. Maybe he had already become

a CIA agent and was stealing timber."

And also “Navralny” (a mocking play on Navalny’s name) is Hitler. Mr.

Navralny, there are all sorts of

epithets there.

Well,

I still don’t really understand what that

means, but apparently it’s something not very

insulting. I’m fine with it.

And that wasn’t in Ryazan, it was in

Tambov. I barely remember. Several

people come up, take pictures,

and say: "Can you stand like this,

and then the fifth person says..." I say:

"Why?" A meme

is a meme, but if we don’t address

these important issues of ours, because,

well, corruption is equivalent to poverty,

because an apartment worth 70 million rubles

doesn’t just appear out of thin air, right?

So who paid for those apartments? We did.

Well, you and I paid. We paid

for it together. I came here and read the briefing.

Now I’m driving in the car and thinking, what an

incredibly rich region this is. What an

incredibly rich city.

How much is it here? Who can tell me, who knows

or can guess? The average, average—not

the maximum—the average salary in the city

is somewhere around 20,000 rubles (about 20 thousand).

25–26.

Well, I’m seeing figures from 18 to 25. Incredible.

Let’s imagine that I’m your governor

or your boss. And I say that you

What, what?

Oh, welcome.

What do you live on?

What do you live on?

He came to us.

What’s your name? What’s your name?

Bella. My name is

Bella. I welcome you. A brave woman—

come over here.

No, I just want to know what you live on.

Please answer me, you’re such a

truth-teller here. What do you live on? I’ll answer.

Let’s do this. I’ll answer what

I live on and what our

election campaign is funded by. After that I’ll let you

film

no need, please. I’m filming. Look,

go on YouTube today and type in

"Tula Navalny" and there will be so many videos

that you won’t need to flirt around with filming

or collect anything—there’s just a lot of it.

And what’s your last name?

Only when I

started filming.

Dear Bella, thank you very much for

coming to see us. And I have, well,

a proposal for you. Let’s make a deal.

Right now I’ll explain what I live on.

Right now I’ll explain what

the election campaign is funded by. And if I

can explain that to you, and you in return can’t

explain where Governor Dyumin’s apartment

came from, then you’ll come to the

rally on the twelfth. But you already

have no idea. So then, if I

can explain it,

I’ll be expecting you at the rally on June 12.

So, first, the election campaign.

Please raise your hands, those who

have ever sent money to

the election campaign.

Please point the camera over here.

Dear Bella.

Here

this headquarters, the coordinator’s salary

at the headquarters. Point it here.

Greetings to you. Thank you very much.

Everything here—these signs, these

leaflets. Why did you stop filming?

Did it get boring? It got boring.

Please continue. I’m not

attacking you. I’m just—no, I’m happy to do this.

Let me continue. As for aggression,

sorry, I’m just speaking loudly so that

everyone can hear. So these

stickers on the phones, everything you

see, was paid for by these same people. In fact,

not only are they paying so that they can

be allowed to work as volunteers,

because they’re sick of corruption, because

they want change. As for

me personally, well, my life is transparent. On

that same YouTube you can find

surveillance footage of how, uh, my wife

walks the streets with the children, how I vacation

in elite hotels in Karelia and Veliky (likely Veliky Novgorod).

I’m supposedly somewhere in Spain. After

they stripped me of my lawyer’s status

following a fabricated verdict,

I registered as a sole proprietor. Right now I am sole proprietor

Navalny. I’m a fairly well-known lawyer. I

I handle cases at the European Court of Human Rights

for Human Rights. I am the leading lawyer in

Russia on cases before the European Court of Human Rights

and I have won more cases than anyone else

there, and a huge number of people whom

this system is trying to devour, and who

cannot get justice in the Russian courts,

write to me: "Alexei, take my

case, I’ll pay your fee." I receive

these fees by bank transfer, I pay taxes, and

I assure you that the police, the FSB (Federal Security Service), the tax authorities,

and everyone else can clearly see all my

transactions. They can clearly see all my income.

And that is what fundamentally sets me apart from

any official. I earn a fairly good

living, but even earning

decent money, this is one of my personal

reasons why I am so

furious about Russian corruption. I, I

will never be able to buy myself an apartment of

330 square meters (about 3,550 square feet), like

that, and even his previous 125-square-meter (about 1,345-square-foot) apartment I wouldn’t be able

to buy. I rent an apartment, and the only apartment I own

is in the Maryino district.

Do you have an equivalent of the outskirts of Tula? Yes.

Well, Maryino is basically the equivalent of our

outskirts of Tula. I live with a view of an

oil refinery, and it drives me

crazy that I’m a person with a normal,

more or less decent income, and I still can’t

get anything. I can’t get a normal

quality of life. And these people who

work hard, who pay

taxes, who study, they also have no

prospects at all, because they have been

robbed. And now, dear Bella,

please tell me, will you come to our

rally?

Absolutely, if

Thank you very much. Hooray!

Last question. In 1990,

1990, let’s say, in ninety-

six you were—

I was born in 1976,

so in 1996 I was...

Very good. Thank you very much.

Ah, so the question was whether I took part in

the loans-for-shares auctions, right? I’m often

told, accused of the fact that, well,

all those damned things—the idea that Navalny was running wild

in the 1990s.

So that means I must have started running wild either in my first year

at university or even back in school

already. And that’s exactly the point,

you see: it’s this government. These are

the people in power, and they keep telling us

about the 1990s all the time.

But, guys, I can see your average age and

I understand that your entire conscious life

has passed under whom?

Eighteen years in power—longer than Gorbachev and

Yeltsin combined, longer than

Brezhnev. And all that time, the country

was receiving colossal amounts of

oil money. Colossal amounts.

And where did it all go? You interrupted us right in the middle of a

very, uh, remarkable exercise.

Let’s film it. Climb right up

from here and film it. Come on, go ahead,

it’ll be interesting. You’ll have the best

video. You’ll have the best video. We’ll

ask you. I want to—I’m asking you.

Thank you very much. I’m asking you. Well,

all right, be shy then. Excellent. Excellent.

Thank you very much. Please film it.

So,

all right, guys, now let’s be honest.

Bella is filming us, and she has

critical questions for us.

Ah, well, our supporter will mark the twelfth.

So, not a supporter after all. I

will try, I’ll try to

convince you, because these people will try

to convince you. I am a person who loves

his own video

comes out against us and says we’re looting everything.

Tell me, please, do you like corruption?

Do you?

And a person who steals billions and

builds palaces all across Russia—does he

love our motherland or not?

Well

And is it part of loving your country

to fight a crook who steals from

the country and builds palaces? Is that

love of country?

Of course,

yes.

How could it not be? What else would it be?

All right, let’s get back to salaries. You

are from...

so I suppose you believe your fellow

locals when they tell us the truth.

So, what is the average salary right now

in the city of Tula?

Well, 20,500.

So Bella, the governor, and I

apparently think you’re all American

agents. So why are you misleading us? You’re

misleading us right now, because Rosstat (Russia’s state statistics agency)

says that the average salary in the city of

Tula is 30,000 rubles.

Wow.

29,700.

June 13. Yes.

June 13.

Where exactly?

Where exactly? Let’s decide right now

which square is your main square.

Lenin Square.

Lenin Square.

Yes, there’ll be some exhibition there, but we’ll campaign there anyway.

We’ll campaign there.

Leni Avenue

Leni Avenue. Damn, I still can’t get back to

salaries. What I do in every

city is partly for myself, so that I can

understand. Because a lot of people tell me

People come up and say, "Why are you

sticking your nose in? We have a normal life in

Russia. Why are you interfering?" Well,

30,000 rubles is the average salary according to

the statistics. Now please,

raise your hands if you know friends,

acquaintances, or relatives who

earn less than 25,000 rubles.

Of course.

Put your hands down. Ah, how much I wish I had you

with me.

Ah,

raise your hands if you know people

who, for a full workday, earn

less than 20,000 rubles.

Thank you. Raise your hands if you know

people who earn less than 15,000

rubles.

15 dollars.

I won't ask about 10. No, let's

ask honestly. Let's do it. Honestly,

honestly, for a full workday—don't

try to play along with me—just honestly

tell me: do you know anyone who earns

less than 10,000 for full-time work,

you understand?

That's what's happening. And by the way,

what is actually stopping you from earning

70,000 or 80,000 in theory?

A little house,

the salary is here,

the duck,

the duck, the duckies, the duckies carried it all away in their beaks.

That's it—your chemical industry here

is operating. It operates and brings in money in all

normal countries; regions where

the chemical industry is well developed

are rolling in it, and your defense industry

is working too, and all of this is being sold. Well,

you do have some industry,

quite a lot of it remains. And regions all over the world

that have defense and chemical

industries are wealthy regions,

rich people live there. And here we are

seriously discussing whether this is good or

bad, whether we've risen a little or not,

considering that wages are

10,000 to 15,000 rubles. How much are utilities?

Six.

Six.

Depends where? Yes.

All right, let's take 4,000. And

let's even take a salary of 20,000. 20 minus 4

is 16,000 rubles.

300 dollars.

Food is 10,000.

And we're seriously debating something. Even though

it's obvious this cannot be normal. Quiet,

guys, it cannot be that

a country swimming in oil

money keeps its population in poverty.

That means the money was simply stolen.

That's how it balances out. Some people have

apartments worth 700 million rubles. All these

wonderful Tuscan vineyards,

the south of France is full of

officials, London is full of officials, while we

here earn 15,000 rubles. In our country, 19%

of the population lives below the poverty line. And

what does that mean—less than how much? Less than

8,000 rubles a month. 8,500. That means

they are officially destitute. They are simply

going hungry. In order not to starve,

what do they do? They grow potatoes.

We built a civilization. I drive past here

by your museum, and there are

rockets and tanks standing there. They built all that brilliantly.

Decent engineers, wonderful

scientists. We have everything. And 19% of people

grow potatoes just to

survive. So what exactly did we build

this country for? What did we build this civilization for?

What is all this for?

For the duck.

For the duck. But do we agree with this or

not?

So our election campaign is about

taking back the duckies and reclaiming

what rightfully belongs to us. Because

all of us here understand, know, and

believe that we can live normally, that we are

not doomed, that all this talk from the authorities

about tightening our belts, that we somehow

are supposed to live in poverty, or that, well,

there is simply nothing we can do to

become more prosperous—it's all nonsense. I

always give one country as an example,

Estonia. Who knows about Estonian

oil fields?

Nobody.

Unless maybe out on the shelf there are Estonian

sprat deposits or something,

Estonian gas, Estonian diamonds,

great ones, I don't know, mineral resources

of the kind Burkhanych trades in

in Estonia. You know, none of that exists, but

the average salary in Estonia is 1,100 euros.

They don't have palace managers there.

They don't have palace management there. And we

will have the same thing.

I absolutely believe that Russia can

live normally on these same revenues. I

absolutely believe that we can fix

the roads. You know, it's such a shocking

idea, right? But we can. Humanity has been building roads for 6,000

years. They've fixed them in Africa,

they've fixed them in Eastern Europe, and yet we

keep trying to convince each other that it can't be done in

Russia. Good Lord, how could we ever fix

the roads? Because over Russia, you see,

there's some kind of vortex spinning around that

makes us stupid and prevents us from

fixing roads.

There's no gas yet either.

I don't believe that. I know all of this

can be corrected and fixed. And, my friends,

in fact, most of the people with

whom we will work believe that too

in everything, and they understand that very well.

They clearly feel the connection between

corruption and poverty. But we have

one enormous obstacle. One of our

most vicious enemies. Who is it?

Pitun.

Fear. Corruption, fear.

The duck, the duck.

To say that we, as citizens,

people's disbelief. That's the main problem,

you see? You can go up to anyone

and say: "All of this

tell them all about it." They'll be outraged by

the duck, they'll be outraged by the palace,

but in the end they'll say: "Well yes, all of this

is terrible, but nothing can be changed."

That's it, we're doomed. And all of them

will definitely say the phrase: "You've heard it millions

of times." Well, everyone steals,

everyone steals, people steal in every country. And

then they'll also definitely say: "Ah, well

fine, to hell with it, these ones have already

stolen plenty, new ones will come and start

stealing again." Have you heard that? Yes.

They always say that.

Always. Unfortunately, we very often invent for ourselves

a million excuses

for why we should put up with this

poverty. But we simply must not

accept it. Well, since you came here at

10:00 a.m. on a Saturday, I can already see in front of me

a sufficient number of people

to win over the entire city of Tula

within three months. Because in fact

this whole regime is sustained not by

OMON (Russian riot police), not by the center, uh, not by the security services,

but simply by inertia, by the fact

that people, well, somehow believe that

nothing can be changed, and that's why all these

guys are still sitting there. But our most important

task is, first of all, to believe in ourselves, in

our own abilities, to persuade people. Those

abilities exist. We've conducted polls many

times. There is plenty of research showing that people follow

activists.

You will campaign, you will spend 5

minutes a day, and you yourselves will be surprised

by how many people you managed to persuade. You

will make an effort to bring people together

on the twelfth. And you will see that

the rally will be four times larger,

because people are mostly led by others. And

right now these people are being dragged

God knows where—into the abyss, into degradation—by 1%,

less than 1% of these active crooks,

these nimble operators. But it should be us leading them—

1% of simply decent, honorable people,

who believe in a normal future for

Russia. Let's make the effort. Everyone

will follow us. We took measurements and

we see that, well, they say Putin has 84%.

On every point in our platform, we have 90%

support. Illicit enrichment, the fight

against it, Article 20—90% support.

Introducing a minimum wage—90%

support. A tax on oligarchs—90%

support. In fact, we here are

the representatives of the majority, while they are

the representatives of the minority. We just need

to step into this political vacuum. We simply need

to campaign, we need to work, I

assure you. We ourselves will be shocked. We'll think,

my God, did we really do this? Are these really

the same people who used to gather somewhere

and stand cramped together in the campaign office? We will

do it. The whole history of humanity is

precisely the story of how small groups

united by a single idea, one they

believed in, changed absolutely

everything. They moved civilization forward. And we

will lead, and we will win, and we will achieve

everything, if we work. Thank you

very much. Ready to take questions?

You see, I and many other

people I agree with. Basically, we are

against rallies, because a crowd is

quite dangerous. You know, in

Russia, rallies, even peaceful ones, have very often

ended badly.

Judging by your feed, representative. I don't

know, honestly.

Go ahead, look for yourself, and well

I'll repeat it afterward. Very briefly.

Just louder, so everyone can hear.

First of all, yes, first of all, against

rallies. Is there some other form

of political struggle we could come up with? Not

come up with, but one that in principle

already exists. Second, corruption really

cannot be defeated very quickly by laws

alone. People have to want it in the first place. In

short, just in case, I'll now

say this. And also

no, it's just that we're out of time, look

how many people there are. As for

as for that, you understand, these

appeals—you are balancing on the edge of

some kind of revolution. What will you do if

So, three questions. I'll answer them. Let's start with

the second. You say people must

become aware. Well, turn around, please.

Here we are, aware.

Exactly, guys—you have realized

the necessity.

What else do you want from them? What exactly

do you want from him? He understands. Am I supposed to

come up and say: Realize it. Realize it.

Everyone is against corruption. Listen, all

adults, everyone understood all this long ago,

there's no need to treat us and all of

Russia like little children. As if you're

simpletons. People say: "But how can that be,

wait a second, you told me, let's

the criminals who

you're living in the past, ma'am."

And that's exactly how it happens here.

A person walks around with a sign, and on the sign is

a palace, and he says: "I want to answer

questions." And you go up to him,

and say: "Just realize it." You realized it yourself,

here's a poster. Just realize it, please,

realize it. You can't defeat

corruption.

Sorry, sorry, apologize to me,

Alexei, realize it.

We won't get an answer to the question.

So that's why there's no need, no need

to demand all sorts of strange things

from people at all. Everyone understands everything.

The people of Russia are not idiots. They all

are against corruption, and they are all ready to live

without corruption. As for

this balance on the brink of revolution,

okay.

Another thought experiment. The city of Tula,

2018. You wake up, and I am

president. Hooray!

Hooray!

Now the question is: does that mean that you

wake up, wash your face, or without even

washing, grab and break off a leg

from a chair, run out into the street

screaming "Ah!" and hit the first passerby

and start shooting. Of course not, you

just go to work and carry on with your business.

Nothing has changed. There are no

preconditions for a revolution just because

look, Governor Dyumin explains to us

about the apartment and resigns if

something is wrong there, or if a criminal case

is opened against him, is that

a bloody revolution?

No.

No.

If Medvedev ends up in the defendant's dock,

is that a bloody revolution?

If the oligarch Usmanov

stops funneling money offshore and it instead

goes into the budget, and your salary

goes up, is that a bloody revolution? No,

That's exactly the point: the people warning us about a bloody revolution

are the very people who grabbed

all of this and say: "Don't come near

my palace, or it will be a bloody

revolution." They try this line: "Maidan (the 2014 Ukrainian protest movement), God forbid,

if you take away my billion,

there'll be a Maidan." There will be no Maidan.

Quite the opposite: if they keep

sitting on top of all this,

they will push people to the point where there really will be problems. And

first, your first question about

rallies. Why are rallies necessary? Is it possible

to choose another form? Another form is

participation in elections. I took part in them.

In front of you, you see volunteers,

who, tell me please, do they look

like people or like androids?

I can see that they are wonderful there. I

All right. Well, first of all, not all of them are

young people. Second, they have the right

to participate in elections. They have the right

to nominate presidential candidates.

Let's ask them right now:

"Guys, I'm asking you to nominate me

as a presidential candidate. We'll just

vote."

Not many hands. Which means this is a very

simple thing. Very simple. They have the

right, and I have the right. I say that

I will travel around the country and unite

all the people who want to go to

the polls, including under the slogan against

corruption. That's our cause. But

they don't want to let me into rallies, into the elections.

Why? Yes,

When Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin comes,

if he lets people get this close

to him, then please go up to him

and ask: Vladimir, we don't

want rallies, we want peace and not

revolution. So stop messing us around,

let Navalny onto the ballot. So

stop messing us around, let him in. These people

have a right to television, they do,

of course. The television belongs to them, after all.

They've just increased the budget of RT (Russia Today) by 2

billion rubles. You paid for that, but you

will never be allowed on. That's exactly why we do not

want either revolution or trouble. We want

simply the exercise of our rights. Right? We

won't back down when they won't let us in. That's

all. Next question. Go ahead,

please.

Alexei Anatolyevich, you won't deny

the special connection between our

governor and Vladimir Vladimirovich?

Well, he was his bodyguard, as far as I

understand, right?

According to some theories, our

governor is the same kind of hired man

for Putin, gathering us all together. And so in

2018, if you face him in debates

against him in the election.

louder what question would you ask him

against Dyumin. So, let me

repeat the question. Some, some people

believe that Dyumin is

Putin's successor. And the question is: if

I end up debating him in

2018, what would I ask him?

Let's think about it. What should I

ask him? Well, I'd ask him about the apartment.

I'd ask something simple. Dear

Governor, this is the first time in my

life I've seen you. I can see your biography. You have been

a state official your whole life. I can see that you

had a 125 sq. m apartment on

Doltsova Street. It's worth several million

dollars. Then that apartment disappeared, and

you suddenly had a 333 sq. m apartment

worth $700,000 in central Moscow.

Explain it—just tell us. Was it

given to you as a gift,

then pay income tax on it. Built it yourself?

Good for you, handsome. Show us.

a construction permit.

So they must have paid bribes. Then there should be a criminal case.

Well, explain it—just say it. Tell me, how

if you got it from the state, then

excuse me, show me the family. How many

people are in it? 333 divided by 18—how much is that?

A lot. About 20.

About 20, right? There should have to be 20 people.

If the state gives you an apartment, the standard is 18 square meters per person,

right? Per person, and

that’s state housing. Show me 20 children,

well, 18 at least. That’s all. And that’s exactly

why they will never

take part in debates. And your question is,

of course, hypothetical. Because

they have nothing to say in response. Why is Putin afraid of

debates? Well, because the very first

question would be: please explain how your

son-in-law became the youngest billionaire in

Russia. And that’s it.

And it all just happened by chance. Like, sure, the dice just

rolled that way and that was it. How did all of that happen?

That’s why they will never go to debates.

And if they do, it will only be because

we force them to. Only when we

here, when they understand from the polls that

all of Tula will vote against

them until they come out for

debates. That is the task of our

election campaign. Let’s take a question from this

side. Yes,

Alexei, Alexei Anatolyevich,

do you plan in your election

campaign to include a plank on de-Sovietizing

city names—for example, renaming Kirov

back to Vyatka—and renaming streets and so

on?

By the way, we are at the level of

murderer,

yes. And by the way, Krasnoarmeysky Prospekt,

for example, should be Tamulinskaya Street, Kyiv

Street, and so on. And that is

really a strange thing, yes. On the one hand, we

have, on the one hand,

on every Orthodox holiday, the country’s leaders are shown

bowing down

in prayer. And at the same time, I don’t know, every

other street in the country is Lenin Street,

or some Dzerzhinsky Street—that is,

streets named after people who blew up

those churches and shot

clergy. On the one hand, on the

other hand—as President Navalny, I

would vote for it, but President

Navalny would not have the right to

rename cities and rename

streets. And if it happened that I

wanted to rename your street right

here and issued such a decree, then

an honest Tula court would overturn my decree, and

you would all quite rightly tell me: "Go to

hell, this is none of your business, this

is not the president’s job." All such issues,

even referendum questions, at such a

referendum. Of course, I would vote for

renaming, but I believe that

the central government should not meddle where

it doesn’t belong. People live there. I am, of course,

against renaming Volgograd

to Stalingrad. Well, you know, that’s the most

controversial example here. But whatever

they want to call their city—well, they

are the ones who live there, after all. I will

vote when the question comes up of removing

Lenin from the Mausoleum (his tomb on Red Square). If they want

to rename my Lyublinskaya Street

to Putinskaya, yes, I should—I will—but

for the central

Moscow authorities to come to you with advice on what your streets

should be called—that should not happen. Next question.

Yes,

me.

Well,

who wants to go first on this side?

Here’s my question. You say that you’re not

connected with the 1990s, with privatization, and

so on. Then why are you dragging along all these

trails of crazy people,

people who are, well, like, I don’t know, for example

that guy—what’s his name—the husband of that Pussy Riot girl,

all those crazy weirdos. Why

do you need them? Just explain it to me.

Could everyone hear the question?

I’ll repeat it. The man is saying to me: "You, you

claim that you are not connected to

the 1990s. Then why are you dragging along

all this liberal-democratic riffraff? Why are you associated with

all these strange people,

like Pyotr Verzilov, the husband of a Pussy Riot member? That’s who

you mean, I take it? Well,

look,

Good question.

There’s a lot there

It’s a good question and a complicated issue, but

look, Verzilov is younger than I am; he definitely

has nothing to do with the 1990s.

Milov—well, look at his program,

his platform. It’s an excellent platform,

take a look. A very good platform.

He says the right things. Besides,

he was a government official. I know—for example, I

would have had conflicts with Vladimir Milov,

for instance. He called me every name

under the sun, but at the same time he served as deputy minister of

energy. A person in such a position

could easily have become a multimillionaire.

But I know how he lives. He has

nothing except legal income.

That’s why I value him in that sense. But in

essence, it’s a complicated matter. On the one hand,

everyone tells me: "Alexei, unite

the democrats." On the other hand, there are many

people like you who say: "Why the

hell are you dragging them along at all?" Well, I

as president must be a president for

everyone. Right now I want to unite as many

people as possible. And so, yes, there is

a complicated issue here. On the one hand, well, there is

there are also crazy people there,

people who have completely discredited themselves in

various ways. But on the other

hand, you want to unite everyone as much as

possible. So I'm in a difficult situation,

and among other things I need your

help here too. And I need you to make

compromises among yourselves. You saw that re

cently I was addressed there with a video message

by feminists.

Yes, a whole bunch of people have already written. Yes, to him

we'll write the text ourselves, record a video message saying

that you told the feminists to go to hell.

I can't do that. There are many different

groups. Some are for guns, others are against

guns. And we held a vote,

for example,

at several meetings. I oppose

the death penalty, while most

people support it. It's

always a difficult and painful compromise.

If I only bring along those

who I know are, well,

the most spotless, honest

fighters, then, uh, I'll simply cut off a huge

number of people, so, well, unfortunately,

politics is this endless

compromise, so I need you

to understand that too. And,

well, we tried to coexist within our

movement for the sake of some larger goal. Yes.

A question, Alexei, from the outlet Sotvision.

Will the June 12 rally be approved or not? If

not, will there be another format? Thank you.

Let me ask you: do you care whether the rally is approved

or not?

No.

No.

Will you go?

Yes.

Who, who, who went on the 26th?

I did.

I did.

And who will go on the 12th?

More hands went up. Nice one. So

that means the rally will happen. And it won't even be

because we're supposedly so brave and

fearless, right? I mean, nobody wants

to end up in police custody. As I understand it,

eight people here were detained, or

10.

More than 50, somewhere around that. 49

administrative citations were issued to different people.

Right, that did happen. But, well, there's little

pleasant about it, yes. Although, by the way, let me remind

you once again: everyone who has gone through two

levels of appeal, please send your cases so that

complaints can be filed with the ECHR (European Court of Human Rights).

It's just that if we don't go,

there is no other alternative. They will keep

robbing us forever. We're doomed to live in

poverty if we don't go. So,

of course the rally will happen. Of course we will

insist on the central square.

Of course, we will do everything possible to make sure

it is authorized, but we're peaceful people,

why the hell would we need all those

police, riot squads, and all that. But if

they, so to speak, tell us in Alisher

Usmanov's words: "Ptooey on you once again," yes, like

for the second time already, we still have to

go, because, well, because it is

our right. Otherwise we are simply admitting to ourselves

that we are just

rightless cattle." It seems to me that our

consensus is that we are not

rightless cattle. Yes. And if

they say that if you get beaten there with

batons, then that's on you. You went to an

unauthorized rally, so

they can beat and abuse you.

And after all

on the 26th we had rallies

in more than

90 cities. Now there are already 217,

I think, cities that have submitted applications. No

one was beaten with batons anywhere. The thing is

that it's impossible to repress large

groups of people. Just look at the panic they were stirring up

before the 26th: "We'll jail everyone,

we'll ban everything," all sorts of horror stories about what

they would do. But in practice, what happened? Well, yes,

we regret it and grieve together

with the families of those people who received

actual criminal sentences, or rather there were

three or four such people.

There's nothing pleasant about serving 15 days. I

served 15 days. Well, I served them, got out,

and here I am standing before you. If I have to do it again,

I'll serve another 15 days. There's nothing all that

terrible about it. In fact, all these

repressions across the country—tens of thousands

took part, and in reality administrative

charges were filed against at most 200 people. At most

200. So of course there's no need to get into it with anyone,

no need to fight,

no need to force your way anywhere or do anything

unlawful. But there's no need

to be afraid either. So they lock you up for 15 days. Well,

it's an adventure. What can I say?

Later on, it'll be nice to remember

someday. Read some books there

— it's hard to end up there for more than 15 days,

right? For that, you just shouldn't

push the police and all the rest, but essentially,

well, fine, they may

say: "We'll beat you." But that

means they would be beating us because

we are speaking out against theft and corruption.

That doesn't really happen and isn't happening

to anyone. The last time anyone was really beaten

at rallies was, well, on May 6,

2012. And actually,

not that many people. That was in the 1990s,

in 1993,

1994, when

the police were openly beating people. I just want

to tell you that here in St. Petersburg, 10

one police officer.

Of course, the probability that there

someone might get caught up in something there

does exist. But the probability that you

might get hit by a car, God forbid, is

10 times higher than the probability that

something bad will happen to you at a

rally. But again, the main thing is, well,

why overthink it?

There is no alternative. If we don’t go to these

rallies—yes, maybe we wouldn’t even

want to go to them at all. I wouldn’t want

to do any of this either; I’d rather stay home.

GTA 5. But if we don’t do the work, then

we’ll always remain in this poverty. Question.

Yes. The legalization of weapons. I’m not sure I understood your...

Well, in your city that’s a very relevant

question.

By the way, this relates to your question,

because opinions differ on this too.

A lot of people criticize me for my position, for

the videos I put out. But I

held this view many years ago when I made those

videos, and I still believe that

Russian citizens should have the right to own

civilian handguns. I

am against handing out, I don’t know,

machine guns, assault rifles, and everything

else. There can be problems with that,

but the main argument against

handguns is

offensive. What they’re really saying is

what they always say:

“You Russians are crazy, you’ll get drunk

and start shooting left and right.” Well, I

find that offensive, because

firearms were sold in the Russian Empire

before the revolution, and nobody was out there

shooting everyone. Look at the Baltics, Moldova,

look at all the others. And the U.S.—well,

what is there to say about the U.S.? And nobody runs around

like a madman with a pistol. Here,

people aren’t shooting each other with pistols. In our country there are

something like 90 million

firearms in private hands, I think. And crimes committed with them

should be far more common, right? But

crimes involving legally owned

firearms basically don’t happen. I mean, you could also

take a hunting shotgun made in Tula and go off and start

shooting too. But nobody does that.

So yes, I absolutely believe that people should be

allowed to

buy handguns and, also,

use them for self-defense,

if someone breaks into your home. As for carrying

them openly around the city—yes, I’m against

open carry, and as for concealed

carry—but having one at home, if someone

is climbing over the fence into your dacha (country house),

then of course you should be able to use it. My home is my

castle. A question about the conflict with

Usmanov. So,

if the information about the rape allegation

against Usmanov is confirmed, will you publicly

take your words back? It may seem minor,

but it could affect your reputation.

So, as for

Usmanov: over the past few days I’ve

devoted myself to studying the biography of this

wonderful man. My head is now full of

iron ore pellets, direct-reduced steel,

and generally metal prices by year, as well as

this gentleman’s book and everything else. I

hope that in the next few days, first of all,

our response will come out, based on

documents and everything else. So,

I stand by everything I said, absolutely all of it.

And you’ll see my response.

It will be based on documents.

My court hearing is on the 30th. You

understand what Russian courts are like, right? But

as for the case itself, I don’t have the slightest

doubt that we will prove everything. And most

importantly, that’s Usmanov’s tactic. He wants

simply to shift the whole discussion toward

whether he raped someone or didn’t. But what interests us

most is whether he gave a bribe

or not. And I know that he did, and

I can see from the documents that he did. And you

have seen those documents. I have no doubt

that you understand just as well that he did give

bribes—because people don’t just

give away a house worth 5 billion rubles for no reason.

Right? Let’s look at the question from that angle.

So. Alexei Anatolyevich, I

wanted to ask you this: aren’t you

afraid that you might come down with imperial

syndrome? Like back in 2008,

when you wrote bad things about

Georgia.

Ah,

when you called Saakashvili Hitler?

I did not call Saakashvili Hitler. I did

once write in my blog,

using a slur for Georgians, and for that

—well, yes, that really was

completely wrong. I did

apologize for it, yes. But

the issue isn’t whether I’m afraid of

catching imperial syndrome. The problem

in general is that presidents and people in

power have a tendency to go bad.

They can also come down with a corruption

syndrome. And here the most important task of

the presidency—and of my presidency, yes,

if we win this campaign—is that I will

build a system in which, if

I come down with some kind of bad

syndrome, you can remove me from office,

you can impeach me. Right now

is it even possible to begin impeachment

proceedings?

It is. Look, Trump was

elected, right? He’s the president of the

most powerful country in the world, and the poor guy

is running around dealing with an FBI

investigation against him.

They want to impeach him in Congress.

Something about his son-in-law being persecuted.

In some way. Here you could raise

complaints about Putin's son-in-law. You can't even

write it down,

that such a Putin son-in-law exists. Yes,

we all know about him, we know what he

looks like, we know his last name, but to this

day it is forbidden to mention him. So,

of course, my main task is to make

the system such that the president, and

I, and whoever comes next, will be under control.

If he comes down with imperial syndrome and

starts doing stupid things instead of

developing Tula Oblast,

and starts "liberating" Palmyra, then

a large number of people will say, "Goodbye,

Alexei." They'll start collecting

signatures, the Duma will impeach me, and I

will step down. That's how it should

work.

Yes. They brought up the governor's apartment several times.

Please tell us, answer

this question. If you found out that this

apartment

that Alexei Gennadyevich received for the Crimea

operation, what would you

If I found out that Alexei Gennadyevich

got this apartment for the Crimea

operation, for the Chechen operation, for

the Kamchatka operation, for the Tula

operation, I would have one question for him.

If you're getting an apartment worth 700 million

rubles, at least pay income tax on it.

That's your income, received in kind.

Guys, if someone gave any of you

an apartment, the tax authorities would

be chasing after you, bailiffs would be

chasing after you, people would be chasing you

shouting, "Pay, pay, pay." But why is no one

chasing after him? So I just

want to understand whether he paid the tax, and on

what basis. Well, how many, I

just don't know how many people are in his

family. Children,

well, no

It's great, you see? Your governor—you

don't know anything about it. That's one of the

reasons. So I want to understand on what

grounds a person can be given

an apartment of 333 square meters? Has anyone

here been given any apartments?

Does any one of you have even the slightest chance of getting

any apartment? No. So why does he get such a

huge one? Because he's an important man, a general?

Fine, say he got a 100-square-meter apartment,

like in Soviet times.

A super-mega-academic

got a four-room apartment. Wow,

great, damn. But this one turns out to be

a fifteen-room apartment. So I

just don't get it.

So, the issue isn't what the reason is.

The point is that officials must

receive apartments according to the law. We can't

just hand them out. Again, ours is a poor

country. If in some federal subject

people are earning 15,000 rubles a month, I,

as President Navalny, would not hand out such apartments,

because I would say:

"Well, we simply can't afford it." I'm more

inclined toward something else. I want everyone

to be able to buy an apartment with a mortgage at

an interest rate of 1.5% per year. I will

pay decent salaries, and as for an apartment,

well, you have a salary—go

get a mortgage and buy an apartment, the way it works all

over the world. Because otherwise

it turns out that in our impoverished country,

if we add another 700 million rubles in housing to the roughly 7 million rubles

of income of the average governor,

then we end up with the

highest-paid governors in the world. In the

world. In the United States, Switzerland, Liechtenstein,

officials do not receive salaries like that, but here

they do. So I don't care

what the reason is. Yes.

Good afternoon, Alexei.

Please tell me, I'd like to know

your opinion. What is your attitude toward st

reet musicians?

Do you mean the child from yesterday,

the one who was detained in Moscow?

No, not the child. I mean your opinion in general

about people who present

their own,

well, street musicians.

artists who, you know,

I feel fine about them. As I understand it,

your question is connected with the fact

that Russia's authorities, foolish authorities,

are trying to regulate this. In

Moscow they drove away the street musicians,

saying they were getting in the way. Yesterday, you know,

there was a monstrous incident—the video is online. A boy,

ten years old, was reciting poetry—well,

nine years old—the police are dragging him away,

good Lord, grabbed him by the hood, his mother is screaming.

I look at all this and think, "He's

the same age as my son." What is all this

for? So I think Russia has plenty of

other problems. Street musicians and

this boy definitely are not creating any

problem. I don't even spend a second

thinking about it. People should just be left alone.

One of the main ideas of my presidency

is to leave alone those who are not bothering anyone, who

are not causing problems, who are not committing

crimes, who are simply earning a living.

A musician sits there, or someone is drawing

something, earns some money—what, did he

go buy himself a vineyard in Tuscany? No.

No—just leave him alone. The person is trying

to earn a living. That's all.

Question.

Alexei, you've probably seen the music video for Leningrad's "Ecstasy".

Was it a coordinated

PR campaign, or was it simply Sergei

Shnurov deciding on his own to support you?

Ah, well, in the video for "Ecstasy," there

there's a character who seems to be

Well, as I understand it, he's still kind of a

negative character, right? No, no.

As I understand it, there's a confrontation there

between a regular, decent guy, a real good old boy,

and some other guy who has

our logo on his briefcase. The fact remains

a fact: the sticker is there anyway,

one way or another.

No, of course, this wasn't an authorized

campaign. I saw it because people wrote to me

about it on Twitter. Well, people are just

having fun. And actually that's a very

good sign. They did what you'd call

an Easter egg. A little

detail that people on Twitter will notice.

Why? Because it creates, as

Sergei Drushkov says, hype. Yes, because

it's interesting. Everyone notices it. Nobody

sticks a little Yabloko logo there

or an LDPR logo or something else. Well, it's

not interesting to anyone. They put ours there because

it draws a lot of attention, right? And

But what if next year it turns out that

you're either not allowed to run in the election, or you

lose—what should we do then? Say you

lose, and once again someone

from United Russia wins, and so on. What should we

do?

What should we do if I lose? Well,

first of all, that's almost impossible.

Listen,

guys, the main task right now is to make sure

that we're allowed to run—and I say "we"

because this isn't my election

campaign, it's our election

campaign—to get on the ballot,

because otherwise once again it'll be a choice between

Yavlinsky and Zhirinovsky, and Yeltsin

has been replaced by Putin. I was at the Yeltsin Center,

and there's a relic hanging there under glass:

a 1996 ballot. The same

names. Zhirinovsky,

Zyuganov. It's a historical relic. And they're

trying to fob the same kind of election off on us. And

the main task is to get registered. As for

losing—any candidate can

lose, of course, even in a fair

election. But my assumption, my friends,

is that if I'm not elected

president, will there be less corruption in Russia

or more?

More. More.

Well, or at the very least, there definitely won't be

less of it. So I think that, first of all,

there will be plenty of work for me and for the ACF (Anti-Corruption Foundation)

to do. Second, all of us, all of us in

the network we've built,

will also have plenty of work, but we

will continue just the same to fight against

corruption and fight for our future. I mean,

we're not going anywhere, are we?

Right? We'll stay here. And

most of us here—this may not sound very

romantic, I don't know—

will grow old, raise children, and die

here. So we have one life. We

want, in this one life of ours,

the only one we have, and one we

value greatly, right? We want to achieve

some normal, positive changes.

That's all. You've already asked a question,

let's hear from your neighbor. Ah,

I don't know if you can hear me or not, what will you

do about military conscription when you become president?

What will we do about con-

contract service?

I, I, I can see, I can see that this worries everyone.

So, I believe—and it's not just what I believe,

the data simply show—that

Russia has been able to afford

a professional contract army since as far back as 2005. We

have enough money. What

is a conscript army now? It's a tax

on the poor, because who doesn't get drafted into

the army? From which regions?

Chech-

Chechnya and

Moscow.

Moscow.

Chechnya. I see. And why Moscow?

It's rich.

They buy their way out. They buy their way out. So the people who end up serving in the army

are those who don't have money, who

live in small towns, who have low

wages. It's like this: you have a poor

family, you already have problems, and instead of

letting the breadwinner work, we

take him away for another year so he can

go build someone's dacha (country house). So of course I

support a professional contract army, and the practice

of modern wars and everything else

shows that a professional army is always

better. Next question.

Alexei, what will you do on November 5 this year?

What will you be doing?

Prepara-

prepara-

just curious.

I've even asked Maltsev about this already. I

said, "Slava, explain this to me: this famous

11/5/17 of yours,

is it meant literally or

metaphorically?"

Well, it's the date of the revolution.

Well, he told me that it's more like the date

of the revolution, that it's more

metaphorical, because a date has to be

set. Well, listen, I'll be with

everyone. What will I be doing? Whatever

Maltsev says?

Well, I certainly support Maltsev

and all his people. I do have

serious disagreements with them on some things. We

don't share the same ideology. But

right now, of course, he's an ally. Of course, he

an ally. So, once again, to your

question. Many people in the liberal camp

keep criticizing me all the time: "Come on, honestly, with

Maltsev, there’s something off there." Well, Maltsev is currently

against corruption, he is against this

regime, so of course I support him.

But as for what will happen on the 5th of

December—well, we’ll see. Or rather, November.

Alexei, tell us about your history

of relations with Yavlinsky, basically,

in a nutshell.

Well, my history of relations with

Yavlinsky is simple. I am very

grateful to him, because I entered

politics by joining the Yabloko party. In

2000, I worked for a long time

as a volunteer, receiving no salary

and just worked. Then, uh, gradually, well,

our paths sort of diverged. They

expelled me on the official, uh, on the

official grounds of promoting

nationalist ideas. But, well, the

real reason was simply that, well, I criticized

Yavlinsky. He is a very good person, he is

a very smart person, and he would have made

an excellent deputy in the State

Duma, but we cannot keep nominating him

for president forever.

The Yabloko party will never win seats anywhere again.

It has reached a dead end, unfortunately,

despite the fact that there are nice and pleasant

people there, they simply do not want to

hear it—they want to believe otherwise.

So, well, I’m on friendly terms with them, but

at the same time I am not going to hide my

view that they have no

prospects. Next question.

Alexei, what is your attitude toward

lustration? Will this process exist in

a new Russia? And do you also consider

the absence of lustration after

the collapse of the USSR a mistake?

Well, let me ask you in return. Do you

support lustration?

Yes,

I support lustration. It is the

main reason why nothing worked out

for us. There was lustration in

East Germany, there was lustration in

the Czech Republic, in all the countries that

jumped from the Soviet sphere of

orientation into the ranks of prosperous countries. And

wherever there was prosperity, there was lustration. In Russia

there was none. And what happened was that this

Komsomol and party crook crowd

first turned themselves into democrats and Yeltsinists,

then they joined the party of

Chernomyrdin and became "red

directors" and supposedly strong managers.

Then they moved into Luzhkov’s party, then

they came to United Russia, and now

they keep hopping from party to party. But this is

just hypocritical crooks who simply want

to stay at the trough. Their main idea is

the trough. And of course it would be good

to remove them from power. But more often than not,

when people talk about lustration, they mean

whether you will jail corrupt

officials. But there is a more effective

mechanism: Article 20. If I

become president, I will ratify

Article 20 and introduce laws to combat

illicit enrichment. If an official

is unable to explain where he got

his wealth from, then against him

a criminal case will automatically be

opened, and he will be sent where he

belongs. Lustration, meanwhile, is punishment without

individual guilt, a kind of class-based punishment. It probably should also be

applied. But that is a matter of consensus, a

matter for a vote in the new Duma, because

the current Duma, of course, must be

dissolved. Let’s take a question from over

here. We haven’t heard from this side in a while. Yes.

Alexei, will you support Gudkov and

Roizman in the elections?

Well, I support Roizman, I’ve already

said that as far as supporting Roizman is concerned.

As for Gudkov, here’s the thing:

I like Dima, but logically, if

I tell him, "I support you in the

mayoral election," then he should say to me in

response that

in the presidential race

support

Gudkov is now saying, "I support

Yavlinsky." So what am I supposed to

say in response? "And I support you in the

presidential election"? I think their

some strange, perverse

political consensus with Yabloko is

harmful and wrong. If they want there

to support each other just so that

there is a comfortable, safe environment,

no one bothers them, but there are also no

real prospects, then I’m not interested in playing

that game. So, well, Dima has to

decide whom he will support. As

for Roizman, he is running with Yabloko,

but despite all that, of course I

support him. He would make an excellent

governor. He is an excellent mayor now and

a good person. Although I also have

various political disagreements with him.

Yes. Will you declassify the archives?

And as for the question of whether

the archives of recent years will be declassified,

naturally, no, because that could

harm our foreign intelligence operations

specifically. But as for the actions of the FSB,

the FSB is running around and interfering with our efforts to open campaign offices.

Well, of course, I will make them declassify

absolutely everything related to political

operations and political repression that

they are carrying out right now. And the old

archives too, of course—yes, we, we still have

post-revolutionary documents that are still

classified. That hinders development.

historical scholarship; it hinders development

of the country as a whole. So, of course, we

declassify this issue. Alexei Avrevich,

if you become president, will you fight

excessive bureaucracy in the country, if there are

any specific ways to do it?

Will I fight bureaucracy? Well,

again, you nominated me. We have to

get to work and fight bureaucracy. Yes,

Russia’s bureaucracy is several times

larger than the entire bureaucracy of the Soviet

Union. The Soviet Union had 260 million people,

whereas now we have 144 million. Half

the territory is gone. Well, not

half, about a third. But the number of officials has become

much larger. And every campaign to

reduce the number of officials leads to what?

More officials. So, of course, yes,

to do that, we simply need to reduce

the state’s interference. Right now

officials issue endless permits,

they even regulate the work of street

musicians. Why the hell do we need all of that

at all? We just need to cut back the excessive

functions of the state and reduce

the number of officials.

Ah,

The second question will be from you. If it’s a

super-important question, ask it briefly.

A super-important question about the Yeltsin

Center. There’s openly this kind of

— to use a blunt word — Russophobia there. Will you

support them or not?

No, well, have you been to the Yeltsin Center?

I saw the video. Go to the Yeltsin Center.

From a museum standpoint, I actually think it’s

a great museum. But it’s all lies there. Inside,

there’s nothing about Berezovsky,

there’s basically no proper information

about the Chechen war, there’s nothing

about corruption and everything else,

so yes, there is certainly a lot of falsehood there. But

listen, in the end he was

president. He is definitely not my

hero. Yes, a lot of people get upset with me because

I said he was an old

alcoholic and so on. Well, he was

an old alcoholic. But he was

president, and I think that since he was

president, then any—more than that, I

believe that if I became president,

would I oppose the construction of a

Putin Center? No. The man was president for 18 years,

after all. So there should be a building

that contains everything about him,

starting with, I don’t know, some of his

good deeds.

Fine, but that’s a bit much,

Yes, everything should be there. It should include

the Rotenbergs, and Kirill Shamalov, well,

everything. In principle, everything about a person

should be there. This is our history, and

we need to treat it normally.

Let’s take a question from the back.

Alexei Anatolyevich,

Yes.

When will you present our plan in more detail,

the program—

Ah,

Well, first of all, as the volunteers are telling me,

it’s available here, and it’s already

fairly detailed even now, at least

in terms of the main basic points. But we will

keep expanding and supplementing this

program. And here again, we need

feedback from you, because an election

campaign is not about something abstract.

It’s not about Lyosha sitting down at a table and thinking about what

should be written in the program. You need to

tell me: yesterday I went around to five

grandmothers, and they asked me a question

I can’t answer. So,

Alexei, your job is

to sit down and write that part of the

program for me. So I’ll sit down and write it. And not

just me — we have economists, we have

a lot of great people. But, guys, once

again, we just need to start this work.

You’ll see that the provisions of our

program are supported by everyone. They’ll

tell you that I stole all the timber.

They’ll say that, of course, but you know

what to answer. We just need to start

doing it, because no one is running

any election campaigns. You don’t

see Yavlinsky, Zhirinovsky,

Zyuganov, or Putin. Emptiness. A complete

political vacuum, so we have to step

into it and take what belongs

to us. I see all of you. I am

absolutely certain that here, in the city of

Tula, we’re going to have a great campaign. Right now

there are 107,000 volunteers across the country. 107,000 is a

gigantic force. Closer to the election there will be no

fewer than 200,000.

With that, you could, I don’t know, turn a city

upside down, change the whole country. We just need

everyone to make their contribution,

we need to learn how to harness our

own strength. Once we learn that, we

will definitely win. Friends, thank you

so much. I have to go to Kaluga.

Thank you for coming.

Thank you so much for coming and finding

the time. And

lovers of happy...

Everything is already

prospect.

So,

please,

one moment. Wait a second.

Can you explain to the person how

properly

right now? Excuse me, please.

And if Navalny is Hitler, then can we

sieg heil?

Listen, it went fine.

Alright, alright, let’s go.

M. Now explain, man.

Here we go.

Yes, here we go.

Hello.