generalspeaking

A New Russia on the Horizon...?

"I don't think -- I'm sure -- he isn't mad He is bluffing. He would like to be viewed as mad, so the West comes to him with a compromise. He is nervous that the West has taken a principled position because he expected to be offered a compromise. He believes that Russia is an inevitable partner on many challenges in the world. Russia is a very important country, but the leader of the country cannot behave like this in the 21st century."
"It is important to demonstrate to Mr. Putin that his behaviour is irresponsible, reckless and not acceptable at all."
"If the West stays strong and gives Putin to understand that there are consequences, then he will not go further. But if some compromise is offered or achieved, that will encourage him to -- maybe not invade -- but to pressure Moldova or launch asymmetric war with the Baltic States."
"The majority of Russians are subject to intensive, intelligent propaganda coming from television -- 100% of which is controlled by Putin."
"We don't have free media; we don't have independent judiciary; we don't have separation of powers; and, we don't have the main pillar of democracy -- free and fair elections. All we have are imitations of these institutions, which Putin controls. He controls the whole life of the country."
"We are not a totalitarian system yet -- we have freedom of movement. But more and more features of the Soviet Union appear in our life."
"Mr. Putin believes he will run forever, but I think it will not be for a long period of time. Within two years there will be big changes. Society will start to realize what he has been saying about the Crimea and Ukraine is wrong. They will understand that change is necessary and inevitable I hope it can be done peacefully."
Former Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov

Mr. Kasyanov gives Vladimir Putin, his nemesis, two more years as the benevolent tyrant of Russia before he is forced by world events and an awakening public, and an emerging political challenge with focus and increasing support even from the hinterlands, to step aside. Given Mr. Putin's unabashed self-styling as Russia's modern saviour and his determination to remain forever in power, the event, when it occurs, will not be one of gracious elegance.

Prime Minister in 2004, Mikhail Kasyanov and other Russian cabinet members were summarily dismissed by the president. He is now the leader of the opposition People's Freedom Party. Recently in Ottawa to deliver a speech to Canada 2020, he was interviewed and spoke of his thoughts on Vladimir Putin and the direction in which he has taken Russia over his long periods of ruling the country as both President and Prime Minister, an interminable, un-Democratic process of everlasting rule.

He applauds the trans-Atlantic response to Russia's annexation of Crimea, and urges pressure to continue, to isolate President Putin on the world stage. Isolation is not exactly what has taken place as world leaders, while aghast at Mr. Putin's belligerence in east Europe, his incursions in Georgia and Ukraine, his threat of nuclear possession, his arrogance in tweaking the alert reactions of nations across the global spectrum, have done little to inform him unequivocally that he has leaped boundaries of permissive international behaviour.

The West, claimed Mr Kasyanov, should insist on the implementation of the Minsk Protocol ceasefire agreement, in particular that provision calling for the permanent monitoring of the Ukraine-Russia border by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. "As soon as border controls are established, all those republics disappear", he stated. Russians, he mused, are consumed with the belief that their country is boxed in by its enemies, impairing its sovereignty; the influence of the state media machine.

He spoke of his party, the People's Freedom Party, banned from running in the Moscow city elections, stating he fully anticipates that the party would be similarly barred from running in the federal elections slated for 2016. When he was prime minister, Mr. Kasyanov launched economic reforms reducing inflation, balancing the budget and growing the Russian economy substantially. Since then, Mr. Putin, he said, has destroyed the institutions of the time, ending the policy of reducing dependence on oil and gas.

When he left office the budget was balanced, oil pricing $27 a barrel. Since then the Russian economy has struggled despite oil prices reaching $130 a barrel, a result of skyrocketing government spending. "Government expenditures increased by 20 - 30% a year on Putin's persona projects -- the [Winter] Olympic games, the football World Cup. It imitates private investment but it's not; it's funded from state finances."

Mr. Kasyanov predicted an economic crisis within two years when the impact of a low oil price combined with Western sanctions will affect production volumes, and state income to a large degree, representing the catalyst to deflate the public's admiration and expectation of Vladimir Putin's future plans for Russian advancement in all spheres of endeavour, not the least economic stability and employment.

One can only ponder the free-speaking relaxation while in Canada of the man who promises to be Mr. Putin's next victim, a man who appears to have bidden frugal contemplation of his own future adieu in the larger interest of informing a nation already critical of his country's leader of how he is viewed by his peers at odds with his government, at home. Recalling the fate of the oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky who also considered himself a political rival and his languishing in prison to put him out of contention, one wonders about Mr. Kasyanov's sense of self-preservation.

On the other hand, Mr. Khodorkovsky is now out of prison, in self-exile, and planning a comeback. He is now re-establishing his foundation "Open Russia", in a return to his pre-arrest hopes to strengthen civil society and to bring democracy knocking at Moscow's portals.

Labels: Democracy, Economy, Russia, Vladimir Putin

posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, November 26, 2014