From: Eagle_wng
In Russia, a cycle of bribes and firings
By Steven Lee Myers The New York Times
Published: June 11, 2006
MOSCOW The secret agents moved in on the senator from the Russian republic of Kalmykia and two associates when they emerged from the office of an airline in Moscow on June 2 with a black briefcase said to contain $300,000 in marked bills.
The authorities accused the senator, Levon Chakhmakhchyan, of shaking down the airline to clear up some inconvenient auditing discoveries. The $300,000 was an advance on a $1.5 million bribe, officials alleged.
The senator protested his innocence even as he declared his parliamentary immunity. By Friday, though, the authorities had ousted him from his seat in the upper house, or Federation Council, leaving him to the mercy of Russian justice.
It was a nifty sting, as if made for TV. And it might have been, since Russia is a place that perfected the show trial for those who fall out of political favor.
But this case, when considered in combination with several others in recent weeks, raises a question that could profoundly affect the country’s direction in the next few years: Is Russia, at last, getting serious about fighting corruption?
President Vladimir Putin would like Russia – and, in advance of the Group of 8 meeting in St. Petersburg next month, the world – to think so. But he faces enormous hurdles, most of his own making.
A pliant judiciary, selective prosecution, the erosion of political competition and the stifling of opposition voices – not to mention a murky official explanation of the senator’s alleged crimes – all play into a public cynicism so deep that even highly publicized arrests are brushed aside as Potemkin justice.
“Society has grown disillusioned about justice,” the news weekly Argumenty i Fakty wrote recently. “A person who steals a chicken might go to jail, of course, but a person who steals millions is welcome to become a member of the Federation Council or the Duma!”
Bribery is so pervasive in Russian society – from paying off the police and judges to dodging the draft to doing almost any business with a bureaucracy now larger than the Soviet one – that a handful of new cases inevitably raises suspicions of selective prosecution.
The most striking thing about reaction to the charges against Chakhmakhchyan was not the shock that a senator might be carrying a briefcase full of dollars. (Seats in the Parliament, as well as the government, are widely believed to be available for a price, supposedly in the millions.) It was the flood of speculation over whom he had crossed, or double-crossed, to get himself in trouble.
Just how cynical are today’s Russians? One theory was that Chakhmakhchyan was ousted, as were four other senators last month, so that the seats could be resold.
“They only talk about corruption,” said Vladimir Ryzhkov, one of the few independent critics of the Kremlin remaining in Russia’s lower house of Parliament, the Duma. “They don’t fight it. They fight only political opponents.”
Putin’s motives remain, as ever, enigmatic. But he has, at least, been talking about corruption more. He inveighed against it in a national address last month, calling its manifestations “the most serious obstacles on the path of our development.”
He went so far as to quote from a 1934 fireside chat by Franklin D. Roosevelt:
“In the working out of a great national program which seeks the primary good of the greater number, it is true that the toes of some people are being stepped on and are going to be stepped on,” Putin recited. “But these toes belong to the comparative few who seek to retain or to gain position or riches or both by some short cut which is harmful to the greater good.”
Roosevelt was referring to unfair business practices and social irresponsibility, not corruption exactly, but that is quibbling.
“I believe social responsibility,” Putin said, “should be the foundation of the work of both officials and business people, and they should bear in mind that the source of the prosperity and well-being of Russia is its people.”
Argumenty i Fakty’s headline played on the allusion: “Whose Corns Did Mr. Putin Step On?” Which is an excellent question, and one, so far, impossible to answer.
Two days after his speech, Putin fired the head of the notoriously corrupt customs service and a dozen or so midlevel officials who were accused of smuggling cars, wine and even yachts into Russia, while skimming billions of dollars from duties on imported goods.
On May 26, the authorities arrested Aleksei Barinov, governor of the Nenets Autonomous District, an energy-rich Arctic region, on charges dating to 2000 that had been investigated and dropped.
On June 2, Putin dismissed Russia’s top prosecutor, Vladimir Ustinov, who himself had vowed that more corruption cases were in the works.
Aides to Putin hinted that more dismissals would come.
Corruption cases can certainly send a message to officials susceptible to bribery, and Putin’s supporters say he and his inner circle understand that corruption threatens Russia’s development as a respected world power.
But Kirill Kabanov, director of the National Anti-Corruption Committee, an advocacy group, is skeptical. He welcomed Ustinov’s dismissal, but said that the true measure of a war on corruption would be a case against someone close to Putin himself.
“In Russia it is always the case some people are found at the lower or middle level, while no one at the top is,” he said. “That is why I think this is just a PR campaign and nothing more.”
MOSCOW The secret agents moved in on the senator from the Russian republic of Kalmykia and two associates when they emerged from the office of an airline in Moscow on June 2 with a black briefcase said to contain $300,000 in marked bills.
The authorities accused the senator, Levon Chakhmakhchyan, of shaking down the airline to clear up some inconvenient auditing discoveries. The $300,000 was an advance on a $1.5 million bribe, officials alleged.
The senator protested his innocence even as he declared his parliamentary immunity. By Friday, though, the authorities had ousted him from his seat in the upper house, or Federation Council, leaving him to the mercy of Russian justice.
It was a nifty sting, as if made for TV. And it might have been, since Russia is a place that perfected the show trial for those who fall out of political favor.
But this case, when considered in combination with several others in recent weeks, raises a question that could profoundly affect the country’s direction in the next few years: Is Russia, at last, getting serious about fighting corruption?
President Vladimir Putin would like Russia – and, in advance of the Group of 8 meeting in St. Petersburg next month, the world – to think so. But he faces enormous hurdles, most of his own making.
A pliant judiciary, selective prosecution, the erosion of political competition and the stifling of opposition voices – not to mention a murky official explanation of the senator’s alleged crimes – all play into a public cynicism so deep that even highly publicized arrests are brushed aside as Potemkin justice.
“Society has grown disillusioned about justice,” the news weekly Argumenty i Fakty wrote recently. “A person who steals a chicken might go to jail, of course, but a person who steals millions is welcome to become a member of the Federation Council or the Duma!”
Bribery is so pervasive in Russian society – from paying off the police and judges to dodging the draft to doing almost any business with a bureaucracy now larger than the Soviet one – that a handful of new cases inevitably raises suspicions of selective prosecution.
The most striking thing about reaction to the charges against Chakhmakhchyan was not the shock that a senator might be carrying a briefcase full of dollars. (Seats in the Parliament, as well as the government, are widely believed to be available for a price, supposedly in the millions.) It was the flood of speculation over whom he had crossed, or double-crossed, to get himself in trouble.
Just how cynical are today’s Russians? One theory was that Chakhmakhchyan was ousted, as were four other senators last month, so that the seats could be resold.
“They only talk about corruption,” said Vladimir Ryzhkov, one of the few independent critics of the Kremlin remaining in Russia’s lower house of Parliament, the Duma. “They don’t fight it. They fight only political opponents.”
Putin’s motives remain, as ever, enigmatic. But he has, at least, been talking about corruption more. He inveighed against it in a national address last month, calling its manifestations “the most serious obstacles on the path of our development.”
He went so far as to quote from a 1934 fireside chat by Franklin D. Roosevelt:
“In the working out of a great national program which seeks the primary good of the greater number, it is true that the toes of some people are being stepped on and are going to be stepped on,” Putin recited. “But these toes belong to the comparative few who seek to retain or to gain position or riches or both by some short cut which is harmful to the greater good.”
Roosevelt was referring to unfair business practices and social irresponsibility, not corruption exactly, but that is quibbling.
“I believe social responsibility,” Putin said, “should be the foundation of the work of both officials and business people, and they should bear in mind that the source of the prosperity and well-being of Russia is its people.”
Argumenty i Fakty’s headline played on the allusion: “Whose Corns Did Mr. Putin Step On?” Which is an excellent question, and one, so far, impossible to answer.
Two days after his speech, Putin fired the head of the notoriously corrupt customs service and a dozen or so midlevel officials who were accused of smuggling cars, wine and even yachts into Russia, while skimming billions of dollars from duties on imported goods.
On May 26, the authorities arrested Aleksei Barinov, governor of the Nenets Autonomous District, an energy-rich Arctic region, on charges dating to 2000 that had been investigated and dropped.
On June 2, Putin dismissed Russia’s top prosecutor, Vladimir Ustinov, who himself had vowed that more corruption cases were in the works.
Aides to Putin hinted that more dismissals would come.
Corruption cases can certainly send a message to officials susceptible to bribery, and Putin’s supporters say he and his inner circle understand that corruption threatens Russia’s development as a respected world power.
But Kirill Kabanov, director of the National Anti-Corruption Committee, an advocacy group, is skeptical. He welcomed Ustinov’s dismissal, but said that the true measure of a war on corruption would be a case against someone close to Putin himself.
“In Russia it is always the case some people are found at the lower or middle level, while no one at the top is,” he said. “That is why I think this is just a PR campaign and nothing more.”
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/06/11/news/russia.php
