Kemerovo: What Happened and Who Is to Blame

Hello, this is Navalny. Today is a day of mourning.

For those who died in the horrific tragedy in

Kemerovo, and first of all I want once again

to express my condolences to all the families

of the dead and the injured. This is an immense

grief, and the whole country shares

this grief. Stay strong—we are with you. Right now

we can see a rather heated

debate about whether, immediately after

a tragedy, it is acceptable to discuss the authorities' actions,

look for those responsible, and demand resignations

from those responsible for ensuring

people's safety. As always in such

situations, we see the position of the authorities and

their propagandists: they shift attention away from

those at fault and onto ordinary people and those who

criticize the authorities. When people demand

resignations, officials always say the same

thing: you're exploiting the tragedy for publicity.

Just notice this: from top

officials and TV propagandists down to

paid commentators on the internet,

they are not condemning those because of whom dozens of people

died terrible deaths. Instead, they have

focused on certain

opposition figures who are allegedly exploiting

the tragedy for publicity. About the tragedy—you all know everything,

and around it certain forces

are deliberately, deliberately trying

to turn people against each other, trying to profit from others' grief

and, accordingly, to dangerously

destabilize the situation. And yesterday we

once again saw examples from the champions of such

disgusting hypocrisy. First and foremost, that was

of course the governor of Kemerovo Region,

Aman Tuleyev, who said that the spontaneous

rally in Kemerovo had been organized by visiting

opposition forces, and that there were 200

habitual troublemakers there.

Not relatives at all—none of them.

Then there was Deputy Governor

Sergei Tsivilyov, who told a man whose

five relatives had died in the fire,

including three children, that he was grandstanding.

[music]

Another deputy governor, Vladimir Chernov,

called the spontaneous rally by Kemerovo residents a clearly

planned action aimed at

discrediting the authorities.

And then our favorite TV liar, Vladimir

Solovyov, angrily condemned the Kemerovo

rally because, in Solovyov's view, its participants, first of all,

were allowing themselves far too much.

When a crowd is shouting, after all,

that's already a Maidan (a reference to Ukraine's protest movement). When a crowd shouts and

jeers,

then you have to understand that this has already become

a dangerous path. You can't talk like that.

When citizens want to have a conversation, when

they formulate demands—that is their right. But when

a crowd demands blood and doesn't care about facts,

doesn't care about anything at all—just give them someone,

anyone at all—then that is no longer a state. That is already

an attempt to slide into a Maidan, you see.

In other words, they want even these people,

driven nearly mad with grief and who came out to the

rally because the authorities are not answering

their most basic questions, to stand there silently,

not criticize their superiors, and bow

at their feet. There is a lot of talk about why people

do not believe that the death toll is only 64.

So, supposedly, provocateurs and/or simply

panic-mongers spread rumors that the number of dead

is much higher.

And people believe it. And indeed, at

that very rally in Kemerovo, it was

very noticeable that none of

those gathered trusted the figures

being given by the authorities.

Of course, we all very much hope that the number

of those killed in Zimnyaya Vishnya (the Winter Cherry mall) will not rise, and

I can say with certainty that there are no real

facts indicating that

there were many more victims, hundreds of victims. However,

how can you blame people for

refusing to believe the official figures?

Look: they are standing in the square, and they

are told the governor's words: 64 people

have died.

And the governor's very next phrase is: down there

there are 200 troublemakers gathered.

The usual ones.

And people look around—they look at themselves and

ask themselves: how can you, you scoundrel,

lie so brazenly? There are several

thousand of us right here under your window, and Putin

is sitting right next to you, silently nodding. He

doesn't interrupt Tuleyev with the words, well,

listen, have some decency, look out the

window—what 200 troublemakers? For several hours

there has been a rally going on with thousands of

people. No—Putin stays silent, and on television

they will say exactly that: 200 troublemakers.

That is why people in Kemerovo and throughout

Russia know perfectly well that you cannot believe

a single word from these crooks. They will look you

straight in the eye and call black white. Without

batting an eye, they will tell the most obvious

lie and insist on it. When we are told about

the number of victims by people

who only just recently, in this very same

Kemerovo Region, were stuffing stacks of

ballots into ballot boxes and then declared the

elections fair,

how can anyone believe them? Of course rumors will

spread, and the only one to blame for that

is the authority that constantly darkens and distorts the picture.

I watched all several hours

of the live broadcast of the rally from Kemerovo, and it is

absolutely clear to me that these people, who have lost

relatives, loved ones, friends, and neighbors, want

to get to the truth. They understand that

their loved ones cannot be brought back, but they

yearn for just retribution, for justice,

for measures that will make it impossible

for such tragedies to happen again. And I want

to say that the people in the shopping center

Zimnyaya Vishnya (the Winter Cherry mall) were killed by corruption, and greed.

to prove my point of view. You know,

how many employees there are in Russia's

State Fire Service?

220,000 people.

With your tax money, you maintain a gigantic

army whose job is to make sure that

there are no fires and that people do not die in them.

Now let's look at the results of this

army’s work. We open the data on the number of

deaths in fires and see that only

Africa is worse than Russia. We are worse than all the former

USSR countries, and in any developed country where

far fewer officials

are involved in fire inspection, the number of

people killed in fires is also much lower.

In our country, 7 people per 100,000

population die, while in Europe it is less than 1.

Now let's double-check what we

have learned.

We open a table with data from the

International Association of Fire and Rescue Services

and once again see that Russia is the worst.

The U.S. population is twice as large,

but there are three times fewer fires there. Here, for every

1,000 fires, 64 people die,

while there it is fewer than two. Even in Ukraine,

the situation is better, not to mention developed

countries. Thus, it is an indisputable

fact: in Russia there is an enormous, very

expensive, and completely non-functioning

system for fire prevention and fighting

them. It is a total, absolute failure,

one of the worst in the world, and everything the

EMERCOM (Russia’s Ministry of Emergency Situations) tells us about its astonishing

successes is a total lie. Yes, of course, at the

grassroots level there are heroic firefighters

saving people with their outdated

equipment.

But overall, this system exists for exactly one

purpose: to take bribes from any

business owner. Ask one,

and they will tell you what fire

inspection in Russia is. This system is paper,

shuffling: papers, approvals, certificates—everything

for money. If you do not pay, they will not approve it,

even if everything complies with the rules. Pay up, and

they will sign everything off for you without any problem. Even

if there is literally a fire there right now, as

was the case with Zimnyaya Vishnya (the Winter Cherry mall in Kemerovo), although it is quite

likely that there it was even simpler. You

remember which party

the director of that establishment belonged to? That's right, she was a

local deputy

from United Russia. They can do absolutely anything, and everything

gets signed off because they are

the authorities. Just look at the asset declaration of the head of

EMERCOM for Kemerovo Region,

and you will be surprised to find a Toyota

Land Cruiser and a house larger than 500

square meters. Where did he get the money for

all of that? We know where. I asked lawyers

and the Anti-Corruption Foundation team to take a quick look at

the public procurement records of EMERCOM in Kemerovo Region.

Within five minutes, a murky scheme turns up:

a procurement contract for clothing supplies worth 19

million rubles (about US$330,000 at the time).

Two Moscow companies, Bio-Kamin

and LLC Neft i Gaz Khim Komplekt, quite

obviously divided

these tenders between themselves, because both companies

have the same phone numbers and are even

registered at the very same

address in Moscow: 1 Lyuberetsky

Proyezd, Building 2, Structure 1. I have no doubt

that out of those 19 million, they stole 10

million. Everyone understands that. And then the question arises:

if we found this in five minutes, then what

were the local Investigative Committee,

the police, and the FSB doing? I will tell you: they did not inspect EMERCOM,

and they did not inspect Zimnyaya Vishnya either.

But over the past few

months, they carried out

searches—yes, searches—in our campaign offices in

the territory of Kemerovo Region: 2 searches

in Novokuznetsk, 6 in the Kemerovo office, and 1

at a Kemerovo staff member’s home.

This system, created by Putin,

has no interest in fighting corruption.

It does not want to deal with fire

safety. It wants to steal, and then

run around confiscating leaflets that say

"fight corruption."

I believe that the entire leadership of Russia’s EMERCOM

must be dismissed for

this obvious failure in their work. The leadership of

EMERCOM in Kemerovo Region,

as well as Governor Tuleyev and his

deputies, must be brought to

trial. Russia needs to study

the successful experience of developed countries in dealing with

fires and implement it at home. There is no need

to invent anything new. If over there

ten times fewer people die in fires,

then there is no shame in saying: guys, we

will look at how you do it and build

the same thing here. And of course, until

a real

fight against corruption begins in Russia, we will continue

to pay with children’s lives for the

bribes taken by Putin’s officials.

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they tell the truth. I would like to express

words of condolence and support to our

leader,

Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. I have never anywhere

publicly declared that I am a member of his

team.

I did not shout about it in the squares, but

today I want to say it: I am a member

of his team,

the team of the Russian people, who are

with him, because for him this is

a stab in the back.