Vyacheslav Volodin
The moving of Vyacheslav Volodin to the position of speaker of the State Duma (Russia’s lower house of parliament) was one of the events most discussed by Russian media last week.
From December 2011 until now Volodin was the first vice chief of the Kremlin’s staff, officially overseeing home affairs such as elections, debates in the parliament, NGOs and political institutions. By common opinion he has been even more powerful. Volodin was dubbed as Putin’s “Gray Cardinal.”
Volodin was brought into mastermind position on the wave of Putin’s victory in the 2012 presidential election which occurred after the Bolotnaya protests in December 2011.
When the 2011 protest movement began, Putin’s ratings went down. Before Volodin, deputy head of the Kremlin administration Vladislav Surkov had called the protesters “the best part of the Russian society.”
Political analyst Abbas Gallyamov recalls that “with the arrival of Vyacheslav Volodin, the Kremlin has chosen a fundamentally different way: the protesters have been called national-traitors and mass demonstrations of the supporters of Putin had been arranged.
“Volodin realized that one must not yield street to opposition.
“He was right: by the end of the campaign, Putin’s rating went up, and the protesters who have been unable to achieve a quick victory, were demoralized.”
Experts cite among the major achievements of Volodin to be Vladimir Putin’s campaign in 2012. In February 2012, before the presidential election, Volodin organized so-called anti-orange rally on Moscow Poklonnaya Hill, which attracted more than 135 thousand people, in part brought to Moscow by buses. The head of state won an impressive victory, gaining 63.6%. All the work of electoral staff was coordinated by Volodin.
Volodin was also in charge of 2016 parliamentary election, in which the ruling United Russia party won 343 out of Duma’s 450 seats: a constitutional super-majority.
Legally the State Duma speaker cannot be appointed by a President. He must be elected by the State Duma. Putin “has suggested” to the Duma to elect Volodin and sure enough the State Duma eagerly and unanimously followed the suggestion.
Formally the move is a promotion for Volodin. The position of the State Duma speaker officially stands the fourth in Russia’s hierarchy, ceding only to that of President, Prime-minister and speaker of the Federation Council (the upper chamber of the national parliament).
Yet historically position of the First Deputy to President’s staff has been considered by many as the most important position in the country, the top position of delegated power.
That’s why the move triggered many discussions: Was Volodin for some reasons demoted, or has the position of Duma Speaker unexpectedly acquired new importance?
Volodin was born February 4, 1964 in the town of Alekseevka in the Saratov district of Russia.
In 1986 he graduated Saratov Institute of Mechanization of Agriculture as a mechanical engineer. In 1995 he acquired a law degree from the Russian State Service Academy. Later he received a Ph.D. degree from the Interior Ministry’s Institute in the St. Petersburg with the thesis: “A Russian Constituent Entity: Problems of Power, Law-making and Administration.” Then for a while he worked in the Institute as a lecturer and assistant professor.
In 1990 he turned to political activity. He was elected a member of the City Council of Saratov. From 1992 Volodin was the deputy of the Head of Administration of Saratov, from 1994 he was the Deputy Chairman of the Saratov Regional Duma, and in 1996 he was appointed to the Vice Governor of the Saratov region.
In 1999 Volodin was elected into the State Duma and in 2003 he became a member of the State Duma again. This time he was appointed the Deputy Head of the faction of the ruling party United Russia, which was founded in 2001. By 2005 he was the party’s Secretary-General of its Council Presidium.
He stayed in this position for two more terms of Duma.
In October 21, 2010 he was appointed Deputy Prime Minister under Dmitry Medvedev.
Nobody ever ascribed any political persuasion to Volodin. He is considered to be an advocate of ruthless pragmatism. Under his leadership the notorious “Foreign Agents Act” against non-governmental organizations was conceived, freedom of assembly and freedom of speech were more limited, and the security forces were expanded.
After leaving the Interior Ministry Institute Volodin has always been a politician and bureaucrat and has never been actively involved in any kind of business. Nevertheless his name was included in the Forbes’ list of the wealthiest Russians and a couple of times Volodin was in the center of scandals concerning corruption.
In 2006 Gevorg Dzhlavtian, a member of government of the city of Saratov in charge of funding of road construction, was caught getting bribed and arrested. Dzhlavtian reported that Volodin ordered to pay Volodin 5% of all the federal money that were coming to the area, since all this money were coming there only through the efforts of Volodin. Back then Volodin managed to prove his innocence.
When asked how he managed to have and report personal wealth estimated at 2.7 billion rubles, a figure many times higher then his bureaucrat’s salary for the period of his entire life, Volodin explained that he owns a blocking stake in the company “Solar Products”, producing vegetable oil. I couldn’t locate in the Russian media any information on how Volodin became the major shareholder of this corporation. Perhaps nobody in Russia is interested in learning that.
Recently Alexey Navalny, the best known Russian anti-corruption fighter, published details of Volodin’s pricey real-estate holdings in Russia and abroad. Navalny’s anticorruption group estimated the value of Volodin’s country estate, which totals nearly 19,500 square meters (nearly the size of three soccer fields) and includes a 744-square-meter home, at some 155 million to 200 million rubles ($2.4 million to $3.1 million). Navalny’s group wrote in its 2013 investigation that this far exceeds his total salary of 17.2 million rubles ($267,623) from 2010-12.
In February 2014, Putin’s anticorruption representative, Oleg Plokhoi, explained to the press that Volodin financed his country estate’s construction using personal and family funds, as well as a bank loan.
This August Volodin invited Navalny and leading Russian journalists to see everything for themselves. Over a weekend he had the guests flown to his property by helicopter for the tour. He said he designed the estate and the home himself, studying the landscaping techniques from various countries including France and the Czech Republic. He said it was completed just recently after nearly a decade of work.
The estate includes a greenhouse and gardens featuring strawberries, pumpkins, tomatoes and cucumbers. The fish pond is stocked with catfish and river trout.
Volodin said the helipad located on the property comes in handy and he is learning to fly a helicopter.
Navalny called Volodin’s tour, which included a tea drinking on the veranda, “very sweet, of course.
“But it mustn’t distract us for one second from the main question: What are the sources of income for building and maintaining his castles?” Navalny wrote on his website on August 11.
Still the main question that Russians ask today about Volodin is a question of meaning of the transfer of this super powerful individual to the position of the Speaker of the State Duma, were constitutional super-majority belongs to the ruling party.
The interesting answer to this question was given by one of the brightest young Russian political journalists ,Ekaterina Schoolman, in her interview to the radio Echo of Moscow. Schoolman doesn’t believe that absolute political loyalty of the new State Duma will make it easily controllable by the government.
She said:
“The economic crisis, the end of which is really not visible, creates the need for the government to constantly change the budget and tax policy. For approving of all of these decisions, government will go to the State Duma. This does not mean that the State Duma will stand in the way of the government and say, ‘No, we never permit to rob the people.’ No, it will not do so, but it will bargain. If one is approached all the time for approval, even for just a formal approval, one will ask for something back for this approval…
“You know, it was happening already many times in the past. This wasn’t publicized, but it was happening nonetheless. The representatives of the same interest groups and lobbyists, who sit in the executive branch, sit in the Duma, sit in many other places. Accordingly, interest groups from the executive branch, from the law enforcement agencies and so forth, are going to the Duma with their legislative initiatives. The Duma is kind of a marketplace.
“Now it will be occurring, say, more actively, more often and more publicly, because everything we do is more public now.”
Who is the audience for this? Why are you publishing this in Lancaster, Pennsylvania?
EDITOR: Excellent question. Unlike as recently as twenty years ago, the Internet has permitted medium that are anchored locally to communicate world wide, because it is the subject, not the source, which is available to search engines.
As popular as are our other contributors, over the course of time Slava Tsukerman’s articles make up approximately 40% of our most read articles.
Slava and I have known each other and at times worked together for over a quarter of a century. A Russian emigre and largely in retirement, he has time to view the various Russian TV channels and web sites on the Internet, as well as to read periodicals and chat with friends and contacts both in the USA and in Russia. Other reporters and columnist can’t take the time or have the background to do this. Thus he provides a unique window into Russian thought and actions.
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Thanks for asking.