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Alexei, you’ve decided to run for president,
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but how are you going to campaign? There’s censorship
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everywhere. No one will even hear you.
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That’s what people told me, well, maybe
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a million times. So here’s an experiment.
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Let me try right now
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to win over one very large city, and
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please watch until the end and
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then tell me yourselves whether I managed
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to do it, even a little. So, let’s go to
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Nizhny Novgorod, Russia’s fifth-largest city and
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one of the country’s key industrial centers
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in Russia.
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Hello, dear residents of Nizhny Novgorod. Unfortunately,
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things in Nizhny are not
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going very well right now. This beautiful city has been brought to
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the point where it has become one of the poorest
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Russian cities with a population over one million. The share of low-income
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residents is 64%, meaning more than half
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the population can afford only
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basic necessities.
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Nothing else at all. Living below the poverty line, with
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an income of less than 9,000 rubles a month (about $150 at the time), is every tenth
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resident of Nizhny. Even public transport in
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Nizhny Novgorod stops operating around
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New Year because it gets cut off for unpaid
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electricity bills. And local officials
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here officially hope that winter
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will bring little snow, because they have no
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money in the budget for snow removal.
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Now let’s turn our attention to
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the mayor of Nizhny Novgorod, Ivan Nikolaevich
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Kornilin. As expected, he is a member of
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United Russia. As expected, he
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tells us that he has devoted his entire life
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to serving the motherland. He was continuously
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elected to the city council for
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22 years, all the way since 1994.
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And, as befits a high-ranking
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representative of Putin’s власти, he is
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an amazing patriot, living the most modest
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of lifestyles and despising the values
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the West tries to impose on us. Here he is
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saying that his favorite way to relax is
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by the river, in a banya (traditional Russian steam bath), or skiing outside Nizhny
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Novgorod. He boasts about how constantly
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he stays in touch with ordinary people.
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He reports that he managed to install as many as four
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benches on Lenin Avenue.
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And this energetic mayor and deputy
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also found the means to buy a thousand
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Easter kulich cakes and hand them out
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to elderly people. And while the lucky recipients finish eating
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the kulich given out by their generous mayor, we
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are going to do something outrageous and even
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plain insulting to every
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Putin loyalist and United Russia member. I take the mayor’s surname
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of Nizhny Novgorod and type it into the property records
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for Miami, Florida.
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And there it is right away:
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someone named Albina Kornilina. Oh, we remember
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that name. It came up in an interview with
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our patriotic mayor. He said that
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he had been happily married for 35 years
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to Albina Ivanovna Kornilina, with whom
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he has two children and two grandchildren.
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According to Kornilin, his grown son Nikolai and his daughter also
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work in government service.
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We can see that on December 5,
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2013, exactly three years earlier,
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Albina Kornilina bought, for
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$824,000, apartment No. 1908 in
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a residential complex right on the shore of
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the Atlantic Ocean. Let’s take a closer look
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at the apartment. It’s in
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this building, the tallest one, right on the
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waterfront. A 42-story residential tower.
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Residents have access to their own promenade pier and
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beach, a swimming pool, a billiards room, and even
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valet parking. Here are the photos and floor plan
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of this very apartment. Two bedrooms, two
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bathrooms, a large balcony,
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and panoramic windows. But wait, you might say,
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there could be plenty of Albina Kornilinas in the world.
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Surely this is just someone with the same name as the mayor’s wife
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from Nizhny. The answer is: first of all, there really aren’t many
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Albina Kornilinas. And
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second, the documents for the American apartment
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list the buyer’s heir,
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one Irina Ivanovna Ovchinnikova,
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who lives in Nizhny Novgorod."
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There are already so many clues pointing to our United Russia mayor
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that we take
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the final step and, in Russia’s own
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state property registry, Rosreestr, order an extract for
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the apartment that Kornilin himself lists
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in his disclosure. It has an impressive
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size, nearly 300 square meters, and the listed owners are
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as follows: Kornilin, Ivan
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Nikolaevich, head of Nizhny Novgorod. His
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wife, Kornilina Albina Ivanovna, the exact same name as the buyer of the property in
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Miami.
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His daughter, Kornilina Irina
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Ivanovna, who changed her surname to
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Ovchinnikova, is likewise the exact same name as
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the heir to the Miami property.
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This is very easy to prove. Look
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at this old photo of the
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Kornilin family. The girls in the photo are about 10 to 12 years old, and
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now look at this photo from social media.
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Recognize the lady in the leopard-print dress? This
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picture was found on the profile of Irina
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Ovchinnikova from Nizhny Novgorod. In
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2012, she got married and changed her surname.
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So it turns out that the women who bought the American property
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live in Russia
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in the same apartment as the mayor of Nizhny
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Novgorod, Ivan Kornilin. So
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let’s stop playing these games about exact
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namesakes. It is obvious that the American
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apartment belongs to the family of the mayor of Nizhny
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Novgorod. Think that’s all? Not
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at all. A United Russia official
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running a small city might
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have just one apartment in Miami. But our
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hero is in charge of all of Nizhny Novgorod.
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Now let’s move to 2014, when the Kornilin family were already the happy owners
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of
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their first apartment with an ocean view. At that point,
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in the spring of 2014, the international
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situation was heating up, the war
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in eastern Ukraine was beginning, and now there were already
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sectoral sanctions. Everyone was talking about
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the start of what was essentially a new Cold War.
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A true United Russia member (the ruling pro-Kremlin party), following the party line
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on patriotism and import substitution, should have
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hurried to sell the apartment in
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enemy Miami, buy a little house on the Black
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Sea, and help defend
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the country’s geopolitical interests. So what
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happened in this case? On the very day
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that a Malaysian Boeing was shot down over eastern Ukraine
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and a real
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Cold War with America was truly beginning,
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Albina Kornilina bought, for
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US$1.1 million, another apartment
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in Miami, in the same building. This apartment
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was more expensive and, accordingly, larger. The total
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area is 159 sq. m. There are also two
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bedrooms, two bathrooms, two balconies
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and a wonderful view from the window. Just imagine
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how nice it must be to live there and think about
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what other benefits can be cut for the residents of
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Nizhny (Nizhny Novgorod). Or about how many
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bus routes should be canceled for those
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lazy people of Nizhny Novgorod who don’t want to walk
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on foot. I’m sure it was precisely the cool
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ocean breeze that gave Mr. Kornilin such excellent
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ideas about how the authorities can explain
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to residents why they should live even
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worse. Personally, I was especially struck by
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what a colleague of Kornilin’s recently said about
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the cancellation of transit passes. A benefit recipient
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no longer controls himself, chooses
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the route that suits him, travels
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however he likes. This is unreasonable, and because of it
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the transport company incurs losses.
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Outrageous. The bad, bad benefit recipient
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rides wherever he wants. Walk instead. Then
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the state-owned company won’t suffer any losses
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and the apartment in Miami will become even
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bigger. Let’s sum up. The wife of the head of
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Nizhny Novgorod in 2013 and 2014
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bought two apartments in Miami, USA,
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with a total value of nearly $2 million
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or 130 million rubles. An enormous
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sum. In Nizhny Novgorod, that money could buy
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around 60 good apartments.
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What’s more, the American apartments were purchased
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in cash. No mortgage is
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registered on them. There is no information anywhere
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that Kornilin’s wife or
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his daughter are involved in any major business
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or have any substantial official income. And
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Kornilin himself, as I already said, spent 22 years
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as a city deputy, and is now mayor.
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His official income for 2015
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was 4.7 million rubles. So the question of
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where the mayor’s family got 130 million
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rubles for these American purchases
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has no clear answer. Though we
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can guess. Interestingly, in
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his latest disclosure, Kornilin did not list
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his wife. Strange, because only
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recently he was talking in an interview about their
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strong, close-knit family. Maybe this is
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a strategic divorce, or maybe a direct
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violation of disclosure rules. We
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sent an inquiry to city hall, but
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received no substantive information.
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What we did discover, however, was that officials had started
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frantically deleting information about Kornilin’s marital
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status from the official
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website. Look: before our inquiry
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it said: "Married, raising a son and a daughter."
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Afterward, the information was deleted entirely. And
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do you know what else is interesting? Using the Miami registry,
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we can even see how much
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tax the Kornilins paid into
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the American treasury. Over the years of owning
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the property, they transferred to the U.S. authorities
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about $76,000
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or nearly 5 million rubles. The registry
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even allows us to see the dates on which
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the taxes were paid. Here,
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look, the last payment was made on November 3,
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2016—that is, a month ago.
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I’d be willing to bet that in taxes in
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Russia, or especially in their native Nizhny
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Novgorod, they pay an order of magnitude less.
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It’s actually interesting how this
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works. There they are, United Russia members, sitting at a
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party meeting, listening to Putin’s latest address,
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passing a resolution that the enemy will not
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get through. We’ll respond to sanctions by
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tightening our belts and canceling in Nizhny
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Novgorod the transport fare benefits.
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They voted, canceled them for the sake of victory over
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Obama and Trump. And then Mayor Kornilin
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stands up and says to his fellow party members:
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"All right, guys, I’ve got to go. I still need to stop by the
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bank and transfer the taxes,
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a million rubles to the municipality of the city of
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Miami." And the guys answer him: "Yes, yes,
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Nikolaevich, go ahead. It’s time for all of us to pay taxes—
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some to the U.S., some to France,
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some to Switzerland." That, friends, is
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my campaign message. Putin has already been in power for 17
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years, and in a year he wants to be re-elected for another
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six. That means ruling for 24 years,
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relying precisely on people like Kornilin.
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This is not the exception, but the rule. If we
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easily found the mayor’s real estate in Miami,
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then with the slightest desire, it could also have been found by
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the security services and the presidential administration.
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They just don’t want to look, because
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everyone has something like this. Because Putin’s
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officials treat Russia as a place to
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make money. And for their children they want
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a better fate, by which they mean
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money kept abroad,
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property abroad, and even
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citizenship abroad as well. I fully realize
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that many people consider all this
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normal. Well, if the Kremlin said
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that this is how it should be, then so be it. And
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the mayor of a city where one in ten people live below the poverty line
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can secretly buy himself
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apartments abroad for a million
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dollars each.
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I, on the other hand, am running in the election on behalf of those who
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do not believe that. So your vote
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at the polling stations is not simply a vote for
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Navalny or Putin, but a choice of
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direction. Do we want a real
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fight against corruption and illicit
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enrichment, as I am proposing,
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having even drafted the necessary
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bills for it, or will we leave everything as it is,
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and put up with another six years? Let Nikolai
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Ivanovich Kornilin secure himself, at our
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expense, a comfortable retirement, while his grandchildren
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become—though I think they already have become—
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U.S. citizens. And as for the residents of Nizhny
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Novgorod, well, let them enjoy every one
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of the thousand Easter kulich cakes (traditional Russian sweet breads) that
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the mayor gave the city, and each of the four
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benches installed on Lenin Avenue
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that Mayor Kornilin is so proud of.
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If anything I have just
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said seems right to you,
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then I have three simple requests.
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First: help spread this
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video, especially in Nizhny Novgorod. You won't see this on
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television. Second:
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go to my website and leave your
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email address so that later you can add
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your signature in support of my nomination as a candidate for
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president of Russia. And third:
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subscribe to our channel. Here
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we tell the truth.