On what money does the LDPR exist. At whose expense United Russia, the Communist Party, the Liberal Democratic Party and A Just Russia live
We continue to consider the "money bags" of each of the parties participating in the elections to the State Duma. In our two previous articles, we predicted a significant change of sponsors in the ranks of the electoral list of United Russia and the Communist Party. This process will also affect the old-timer of the national parliament - the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR). Its permanent leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky changed some of his former sponsors, and even won in this process. The correspondent of Our Version tells about the new and old "personal wallets" of this party.
Like the Communist Party, the peak of the financial power of the Liberal Democratic Party is in the past. For example, in the 2003 State Duma elections, Zhirinovites were supported by such wealthy corporations as Basic Element (Russian Aluminum), Alfa-Bank, Nafta-Moscow (formerly Soyuznefteexport) and LUKOIL. The party's ability to make money by lobbying someone's business interests was legendary in the Duma lobby. After all, the LDPR faction over and over again remained in a significant minority, yielding in size not only to the ruling party, but also to the same Communist Party. However, the communists traditionally lagged behind the Zhirinovites in terms of the size of the party treasury during the pre-election period. Too flexible, like no other party, the position of the Liberal Democratic Party was able to change depending on the wishes of the customer! Which is one of the main advantages of a lobbyist.
the federal leadership no longer refuses the regional branch to finance the election campaign. According to the agency "UralInformBuro", the Tyumen and Chelyabinsk liberal democrats received 5 million rubles from Moscow, the Kurgan - 3 millionThis skill, of course, has not disappeared anywhere. However, the monopoly position of United Russia in the State Duma, which has been established since 2007, has deprived large corporations of their former active interest in the services of Zhirinovsky and his comrades. Therefore, already in the elections to the State Duma-2007, the main part of the party fund was replenished by 15 little-known CJSCs and LLCs, that is, representatives of regional businesses. The situation has not changed even now, only a cohort of sponsors had to be updated ...
Zhirinovsky himself, in a recent interview, stated that the Liberal Democratic Party had no sponsors: “We do not ask anyone not to look like beggars. The Liberal Democratic Party lives on those 10 million rubles that it officially receives monthly from the budget. I myself also live only on the Duma's salary. However, according to recent data from the Central Election Commission of the Russian Federation, even the official budget of this party is already 343 million rubles - 143 million more than four years ago. Moreover, in terms of the volume of the treasury, the LDPR is ahead of all (!) parties, except for the Right Cause, benefited by injections of its ex-leader, oligarch Mikhail Prokhorov. For comparison: the pre-election budget of the Patriots of Russia party is only 160 thousand rubles.
Director of the Department of Regional and Municipal Programs of the Center for Political Technologies Andrey Maksimov notes: “The Liberal Democratic Party usually conducts a fairly large-scale election campaign and relies on the active positioning of its leader. By attracting numerous sponsors to its list, the Liberal Democratic Party usually has such financial resources which distinguish it favorably from other parties. Aleksey Mukhin, Director General of the Center for Political Information, believes: “Recently, Zhirinovsky has been working with sponsors a lot and willingly. The Liberal Democratic Party decided to abandon the scandalous lists, which made it possible to attract serious sponsors who are counting on its lobbying potential in the new Duma.
As Vladimir Taskaev, curator of the LDPR in the Urals Federal District, said, however, according to knowledgeable people, this money will only be enough for a minimum of advertising. Most of The pre-election budget goes according to black or gray accounting, and here the whole calculation is on regional sponsors.
On this topic
Of those who previously represented the interests of Russian oligarchs in the Liberal Democratic Party, only the former deputy general director of LUKOIL - Western Siberia» Vasily Tarasyuk, who currently holds the post of Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on local government. As befits a native of this corporation, he heads the regional group of the LDPR electoral list, uniting the Khanty-Mansiysk and Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrugs - the most oil and gas producing regions of the country. However, Tarasyuk can rather be considered a representative of Nafta-Moskva, since immediately before being elected to the Duma, he served as general director of the Afipsky oil refinery owned by this company.
The owner of Nafta-Moskva himself, businessman Suleiman Kerimov, who ranked seventh among Russian billionaires with a fortune of $12.6 billion, moved from the Liberal Democratic Party to United Russia (ER). Other former eminent "wallets" of the Zhirinovsky party also departed there - the ex-deputy general director of Basic Element Valentin Bobyrev, the former vice president of Alfa Bank Konstantin Vetrov. On the run from the investigation is the former owner of the Moscow National Bank and Unikombank Ashot Yeghiazaryan ...
Curious intersections between the Duma factions of the Liberal Democratic Party and United Russia will continue in the future State Duma. Thus, the St. Petersburg regional group of the LDPR list is headed by Denis Volchek, former chairman of the board of directors of the insurance company RusMed and OJSC Farmakon, the largest pharmaceutical plant in St. Petersburg, who is now deputy chairman of the Duma Committee on the financial market. It is curious that the head of the same committee, Vladislav Reznik (United Russia), who is considered one of the main lobbyists of her faction, was also a member of the board of directors of RusMed. Here's a "coincidence"...
No. 1 in the regional group of the LDPR list, which includes the Republic of Mari El and the Kirov Region, is Kirill Cherkasov, member of the State Duma Committee on Economic Policy and Entrepreneurship, former chairman of the board of directors of Stroyproekt-service LLC, Kirov. This structure belongs to the regional oligarch, the president of Sputnik OJSC, Oleg Valenchuk, who is now a member of the same Duma committee, but only from United Russia (!) and occupies a passing place in the current election list of the ruling party. Moreover, Cherkasov, a member of the LDPR faction, was among the founders of the public fund for supporting the United Russia, along with the founders of this party.
As already mentioned, the main calculation of the Liberal Democratic Party is now on regional sponsors. Some of them have long been in this factional system. The highest place among them - No. 10 in the federal part of the list - is occupied by the former general director of CJSC Rosnefteresurs and co-owner of the Tuapsinsky meat processing plant, and now deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on civil, criminal, arbitration and procedural legislation Yuri Napso. The Sverdlovsk regional group on the list is headed by the owner of the construction company Ural-Baikal, Vladimir Taskaev, who, of course, is a member of the Duma Committee on Construction and Land Relations.
No. 1 in the group that unites the Khabarovsk Territory, the Sakhalin Region and the Jewish Autonomous Region is the ex-general director of the Alkuma timber trading company Sergey Furgal, now deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Federation Affairs and Regional Policy. The Yaroslavl regional group is headed by Leonid Slutsky, First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on International Affairs, a former banker who worked in senior positions at Prominvestbank and Investcredit Bank.
Part of those, the former, give way to new "purses". The best illustration of this process is the Volgograd regional group, where only the second and most likely impassable line is assigned to Andrey Lebedev, a member of the LDPR faction in the State Duma, the former chairman of the board of directors of OAO Energomashbank. He is ahead of him in the same group by another businessman, Deputy General Director of CJSC Volzhskprodkompleks, Dmitry Litvintsev.
A new sponsor appeared in the Chelyabinsk regional group, which became impoverished after the departure of the sponsor of the local Zhirinovites, businessman Oleg Kolesnikov, to the United Russia, where he received a passing place on the list. The next “purse” of the South Ural branch was the 33-year-old son of the president of the Eurasian Construction Company, the general director of Industrial Investments, Sergey Weinstein.
The original "replacement" also occurred in relation to the former State Duma deputy from the Liberal Democratic Party, a major timber merchant from Leningrad region Damira Shadayeva. In the Tatarstan regional group of the LDPR list is ... his wife Irina Shadayeva, already elected to the Legislative Assembly of the same, of course, Leningrad region. As they say, a holy place is never empty...
The law on increased state funding of political parties participating in the presidential elections in the Russian Federation (including those already held this year!), Was adopted in the final reading by the State Duma of the Russian Federation. Financing of parties from the budget is increased by 8 times. And this is against the backdrop of increasing VAT, state duties, retirement age and other measures to fill the treasury. The people invest, the politicians receive. And many times more than spent on the elections. Let's look at the numbers.
Financing of parties from the budget will increase from 20 to 152 rubles for each voter who voted for a party candidate. That is, it will increase almost 8 times. If earlier such state financing required 256 million rubles, now the budget of the Russian Federation will need to give 2 billion to party funds.
A prerequisite is that parties and movements must have the support of 3% of the votes. The new law also applies to the presidential elections held on March 18, 2018.
This means that the costs will be reimbursed by the Liberal Democratic Party and the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, their candidates won more than 3%, the United Russia will be left with nothing, since Vladimir Putin went to the presidency as an independent candidate, having spent 400 million rubles from his own election fund. But if Putin again represented United Russia in the 2018 elections, as in 2012, then the ruling party could count on 8.5 billion rubles (with 67% approval) or even 10 billion rubles (with 76%).
The Communist Party will return 1.3 billion rubles, the Liberal Democratic Party - 631 million rubles, the amounts are calculated according to the percentage of support for candidates by voters. At the same time, the protege of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Pavel Grudinin spent 227 million rubles on the elections, and the eternal nominee of the Liberal Democratic Party Vladimir Zhirinovsky - 398 million. A very good "income"!
Opinions are already being expressed that all this is very similar to bribing the so-called systemic opposition.
Information from the Russian Press: The law on state support for political movements and associations appeared in 2001 against the backdrop of the law on parties. In Russia in last years almost all parliamentary parties, "ER", the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, the Liberal Democratic Party and "Fair Russia" have successfully mastered the corridor of state funding in the range from 70 to 80%.United Russia became especially dependent on federal tranches from the budget. Donations from companies and citizens to her address have been steadily declining in recent years, so party functionaries have to place more and more hopes on the state treasury.
A photo: RIA Novosti, Polit.ru
[“Arguments of the Week”, Prepared by Mikhail TULSKY]
In the first and second parts of our investigation, we have already written about the sponsors of United Russia (ER), the Communist Party and Just Russia (SR). EP has three major official sponsors - the Mechel, Guta and Krasny Vostok groups.
HOWEVER, in the official financial report EP in 2006 there are also branches of the largest monopolies - Gazprom, Rusal, Lukoil and TNK-BP. At SR the main sponsor is the head of her faction in the State Duma A. Babakov, who heads the board of directors in the Russian Federation FC CSKA(his name is also associated market "Luzhniki"), in Latvia - Tempbank, and in Ukraine owns a dozen oblenergo. The Communist Party of the Russian Federation is the only party among the parties that lives mainly on membership dues and state funding, which account for almost 60% of the proceeds to the party fund. In addition, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation and its deputies help: for example, deputies of the Moscow City Duma from CPRF N. Gubenko, S. Nikitin, V. Lakeev and V. Ulas back in December 2005, they decided to deduct 40% of the deputy's salary to the parties, and since then they have strictly observed it.
The party of V. Zhirinovsky is financed by everyone except Gazprom and Rosneft
MAIN part of the party fund LDPR(104.4 million rubles in 2006) were replenished by only 15 CJSCs and LLCs. But none of these legal entities has any fame, besides, they were established by unknown people (although often related). Among the real sponsors of the party of V. Zhirinovsky there are “almost all large companies, with the exception of Gazprom and Rosneft.
Are big businessmen leaving the Liberal Democratic Party?
When asked which companies were represented among the “disguised sponsors”, the source replied: “Look at those who became deputies on the LDPR list: which companies delegated their people to the list are still financing the party.” Indeed, back in 2003, quite respectable and well-known persons entered the State Duma on the lists of the Liberal Democratic Party. These are the deputies O. Deripaska by his companies "Rusal" and "Basic Element" E. Ivanov and V. Bobyrev, former Vice President Alfa Bank K. Vetrov(however, the source considers him not a protege of Alpha, but a nominee of the deputy head of the Kremlin V. Surkova), owner of company "Nafta-Moscow" S. Kerimov, vice president "LUKOIL - Western Siberia" V. Tarasyuk and businessman A. Yeghiazaryan.
However, by now, many of the businessmen have moved from the Liberal Democratic Party to United Russia (ER): they have already joined the ruling party V. Bobyrev, K. Vetrov and S. Kerimov, leaving the Liberal Democratic Party for a "more solid party" does not exclude and E. Ivanov. Even in the previous composition of the Duma, the brothers also moved from the Liberal Democratic Party to the United Russia M. and S. Gutseriev who own BIN-bank and RussNeft.
What kind of sponsors in this case remained in the Liberal Democratic Party? Definitely remains a lumberjack D. Shadayev, State Duma deputy from the Liberal Democratic Party. In March, his wife passed on the list of the Liberal Democratic Party to the Leningrad Regional Duma.
Among the sponsors of the Liberal Democratic Party there are also two construction companies from Eka-te-rin-burg: "Ural-Siberian" and "Ural-Bay-Kal". The owner of the latter is the head of the Sverdlovsk Liberal Democratic Party V. Taskaev.
Chubais stopped financing SPS?
SPONSORS THX– a number of business structures, among which there are not only RAO "UES", but not even a single regional energy. However, this hardly means that Chubais stopped financing the Union of Right Forces, most likely, and here we are dealing with "disguise". After all, the SPS received the largest amount of 5.9 million from Fund "Support for Democratic Unity". And this fund, in turn, is headed by a “Chubaisovets” V. Nekrutenko, who worked together with Chubais in the early 1990s at the State Property Committee.
Another considerable amount (3 million) was given to the Union of Right Forces by bills of exchange by its Khabarovsk chairman, a businessman A. Barzhanov. By the way, his wife M. Barzhanova- Deputy of the State Duma from the United Russia and deputy coordinator of the United Russia for the Far East: she used to be the leader of the Khabarovsk right, and when she left for the United Russia, she handed over the chairmanship of the Union of Right Forces to her husband.
The main sponsor left the party of M. Barshchevsky
BASIC donations to the party M. Barshchevsky "Civil Force"(recently called "Free Russia") in 2006 introduced 5 business structures. And behind them are only two businessmen. Out of 13.6 million, the founder of the party and chairman of its political council is a Sverdlovsk businessman A. Ryavkin contributed only 0.5 million to the party's cash desk. And the remaining 13.1 million in 2006 were contributed by the owner's structures "Rostselmash" K. Babkin("Social Initiative", "Eurostrategy" and etc.). Moreover, after Mr. Babkin deposited this money, he realized that he had been "swindled": having taken the money, Mr. Ryavkin immediately dismissed K. Babkin from the post of head of the party's executive committee. Now the main sponsor assures that won't give you a penny more the party of Mr. Barshchevsky.
The State Duma has increased the amount of payments due on the basis of the results of the presidential elections to parties whose candidates won more than 3% of the vote. The relevant amendments to the law "On political parties of the Russian Federation" were approved in the second reading. For each vote of the elector, the federal budget will have to pay 152 rubles. instead of the previous 20 rubles. Only the Communist Party of the Russian Federation and the Liberal Democratic Party, which will receive almost 2 billion rubles, will be able to count on the replenishment of party funds. "United Russia" will not receive money, since Vladimir Putin went to the polls as a self-nominated candidate.
On Thursday, State Duma deputies approved in the second reading a bill introduced by the heads of all Duma factions at the suggestion of LDPR leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky, which increases cash payments to parties for participating in presidential elections. Parties whose candidates won more than 3% of the vote will be able to count on one-time financial support from the federal budget at the rate of 152 rubles. per vote instead of the previous 20 rubles. The corresponding amendment to the law "On Political Parties of the Russian Federation" was approved by the deputies unanimously without discussion.
New rates for the participants of the presidential elections will require additional costs from the budget.
With the previous 20 rubles. state support for parties following the results of the March presidential elections would have cost the treasury about 256 million rubles. Now it will take almost 2 billion rubles.
In this case, only two parties will receive money. CPRF, whose candidate Pavel Grudinin scored 11.77%, will receive more RUB 1.3 billion. According to the Central Election Commission, Mr. Grudinin, who became the second, spent about 227 million rubles on the elections. LDPR, which was represented in the elections by her permanent leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky (third place with 5.65%), will receive more than 631 million rubles. He spent 398 million rubles on the campaign.
"United Russia" will not receive money, since the legislation provides for state support exclusively for parties, and Vladimir Putin went to the polls as a self-nominated candidate. The winner of the election, Vladimir Putin, won 76.69% of the vote (he spent 399 million rubles on his campaign). If Mr. Putin, for whom more than 56.4 million Russians voted, went to the polls from United Russia, as was the case in 2012, then the ruling party could replenish its cash register by 8.5 billion rubles.
State support for political associations was legalized in 2001, along with the adoption of the law on political parties. Payments are due to parties for participation in the Duma and presidential elections. Deputies index the price of a vote in the Duma elections (it is also necessary to score 3%) with enviable regularity, over the past ten years gradually raising payments from 20 rubles. per vote (2007) up to 152 rubles. (2017). At the same time, the rates for the presidential elections were never revised. Recall that the payment for participation in the presidential elections is one-time, and parties receive money for the Duma elections every year until the next parliamentary elections.
The presidential elections of 1996 may forever remain the sweetest memory of image makers, political scientists, experts and luminaries of electoral technologies. The political party with the dances of candidates on hastily put together stages, hosts of artists scurrying around the country, photocopier boxes, a riot of compromising evidence, generously flavored with a 300% yield of T-bills, most likely will not happen again. After August 17, an enchanting show in a luxurious restaurant called "Russian Elections" is in danger of moving, if not to a canteen, then to a more modest political cafe without frills.
Poor elections?
For the entire four-month election campaign, a presidential candidate is legally allowed to use no more than 250,000 minimum wages. If in 1996 it was about 2.5 million dollars, then after August 17 this amount decreased by 2.5 times. It is clear that you can't run for president for a million dollars. At least in Russia, where the picky voter demands special treatment.
Three years ago, several major bankers independently calculated the minimum cost of a presidential campaign. Even then, the lower limit of expenses seemed huge - $ 20 million! - and now it looks completely unrealistic. And where are those bankers now?
However, 1996 showed that practically not a single presidential candidate met the official standards. A photocopier box with half a million dollars in this sense served as a good measure of real campaign spending. Now, after two years, it makes no sense to hide the fact that the participants in the election race used over-the-limit donations from large sponsors. Some oligarchs even practiced this just in case. called fan financing, paying the expenses of several candidates at once.
After August 17, it can be stated that not only did the ruble feel better, but the number of sponsors somehow decreased. Most large companies and banks barely make ends meet - according to estimates for 1999, they already have continuous losses planned. And then there's Yuri Maslyukov promised a decline of 2-3% next year. The budget for elections is also not an assistant.
So where will the future presidential candidates get money from, who will finance their pre-election blocs, parties and movements? If you decide to run for president, Primakov, Luzhkov or Yavlinsky, we are convinced that there will be no problems with financing their campaigns. Birds of such a flight, however, like the Swan, will not have to think about money. They will bring it on a platter.
The money of the party is the money of the people
But who will help the candidate, the presidents from the Communist Party or the NPSR - this is a big question. And in this regard: who is now financing the communists, leading a stormy political life? After all, the party practically does not get out of all sorts of election campaigns. Its candidates take part in elections of various levels and types - for vacant seats in the Duma, in the elections of governors and deputies to legislative assemblies of regions, to other bodies of local self-government. The process is put on stream and requires constant feeding with money.
In addition, the party holds a lot of events - congresses, plenums, conferences, seminars, round tables, etc. The party is the founder of some printed publications, not only regional, but also central. But most importantly, the party has a huge network of its structural subdivisions - regional committees, reskoms, city committees, district committees, etc.
In a word, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation is a very expensive party and, therefore, rich if it allows itself such expenses. The Communist Party of the Russian Federation has the right to declare investments in its structure a trade secret. And of course, no one will be able to track all the streams and channels of receipt of money in the party fund. It is too big and ramified, party discipline is too strict in it.
Correspondents often asked questions about the sources of funding for the Communist Party and, not receiving answers to them, were forced to draw their own conclusions. For example, it is difficult to assume that the communists are helped by big capital (we do not take into account isolated cases of payment for specific services). In addition, it is difficult to assume that the “Russian-speaking bankers” (as Gennady Zyuganov called them in his speech at the II Congress of the NPSR) will dig their own grave with their own hands, sponsoring the communists. It would also be logical to assume that there should not be very many communist entrepreneurs and their possibilities are insufficient to cover all the expenses of the party.
So, if private (bourgeois) capital does not work with the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, if it has not received billions of dollars as a legacy from the CPSU (it’s hard to believe), if we discard the very exotic versions about the foreign or criminal origin of the “party gold” (although we remember sponsorship Greek communists over the newspaper Pravda and the expropriation of postal money by the Bolsheviks for the needs of the party), then only one major source of money remains. This is the budget.
There is nothing fantastic about the fact that the Communist Party of the Russian Federation can be financed from the budget. Too many governors rely on communists. They dispose of too much money in their regions. It is in their power to determine the directions for the use of this money, to place orders with certain companies and organizations scattered throughout Russia. These budgetary funds eventually return to local budgets, but the income (interest) from their use may well go straight to the party fund. Another question: what are these mysterious companies that work for the party fund of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation and how many of them?
Vidmanov Empire
Many snobs consider the communists to be a kind of felt boots, incapable of commercial activity. It is not true. For example, in the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (an analogue of the former Politburo) there is one very decent businessman. This is Viktor Mikhailovich Vidmanov. The chroniclers of the life of the oligarchs, of course, could not ignore such a colorful personality who, on the one hand, occupies a leading position in the party, and on the other hand, quite successfully makes money, probably thereby overcoming his own communist convictions. Viktor Vidmanov now heads Agropromstroybank (APSB), a landmark organization for the communists. The sign of Agropromstroybank often falls into the frame of a telephoto lens when the communists hold their closed plenums in its premises.
APSB is not some kind of sharashka office, but a completely full-fledged commercial bank that received a banking license from the Central Bank back in 1992, when there was no such organization as, for example, ONEXIMbank. True, like ONEXIMbank, APSB was drawn into a series of scandals by the market elements. For example, APSB was one of the largest debtors of Chara Bank, having borrowed 3 billion non-denominated rubles from it. In this regard, the Moscow court of Arbitration even seized the correspondent account of APSB after the license was revoked from Chara. It was believed that the non-return of these 3 billion rubles. became one of the Causes of Chara's bankruptcy.
However, at that time, the management of the APSB managed to remove the arrest from their account, citing the fact that their bank was an authorized bank to finance the government program of "restoring the national economy of the Chechen Republic." It is known that the "restoration of the national economy" of Chechnya ended in the same way as the development of the bank "Chara".
However, it would be foolish to think that APSB made money solely by “restoring” the national economy” of Chechnya, by borrowing money from the unfortunate Chara, selling counterfeit dollars through its exchange offices in Stavropol, or not returning debts to Sberbank. And there is no doubt that the bank earns quite decent money. In any case, after August 17, APSB at one time occupied the honorable 25th place in terms of the amount of loans issued to non-residents, that is, to foreigners. By the way, lending to foreigners is a completely legal way of exporting capital from Russia, which the communists are so fighting against.
So what did APSB earn and earn money on? We have already written about non-repayment of debts as an essential article of the business of this bank. One more curious fact should be added to this. APSB issued savings certificates in 1993 and sold them to businesses and the public. And interestingly, after four years, the bank was not presented with certificates for almost 10 billion non-denominated rubles for redemption. That is, some people or firms did not insist that APSB return this gigantic debt to him. Typically, this situation occurs when creditors are in some way dependent on the debtor. We do not know how dependent on the APSB are its debtors, but we are clearly talking about some kind of non-commercial, possibly party-political relations.
The second part of APSB's business is its numerous subsidiaries, which are allowed, among other things, to work with budget money. It is curious that there are a lot of such structures and, as a rule, they are personally controlled by Viktor Vidmanov and his sons, Oleg and Vladimir Vidmanov. We may be wrong, but, according to our estimates, APSB has several dozen "daughters", most of which have the same legal address as the "mother" - Moscow, Krasina lane, 16.
These include: AOOT Razvitie Sela (construction services), Russian Society of Construction Engineers, Russian Mortgage Company, AOZT-Agroshelkservis (trading and intermediary services), LLP Ros-agroengineering/GGR (one among the co-founders - the firm "Glrbal Grows-Russia" from the state of California, USA) and many others. But, of course, the Rosagropromstroy corporation plays the main role in the Vidmanov empire, along with APSB.
Most high-profile fact the use of budget money by the company "Rosagropromstroy" happened in 1995-1996. Then Viktor Vidmanov's corporation transferred 16 billion rubles to a certain Penzaagrozhilstroy JSC (as it turned out later, to its own subsidiary). budget money. This money should have been spent on the restoration of Chechnya. However, the competent authorities claim that a significant part of them was spent "for other purposes", and the proceeds from the misappropriation of money settled in private commercial structures. Taking into account the penalties, tax violations only for this operation exceeded 800 million rubles.
All these facts indicate that the ideological convictions of Viktor Vidmanov, a member of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, do not at all prevent him from engaging in banal market affairs. In fact, in the person of Mr. Vidmanov, we have the first communist oligarch, that is, a person who not only does business, but also strongly influences politics. Back in 1996, Vidmanov was raising money for the election campaign of Gennady Zyuganov. The party appreciated his merits, and already in August of the same year, almost at the same time when Anatoly Chubais headed the presidential administration for his electoral merits, Vidmanov joined the coordinating council of the NPSR. And on April 20, 1997, at the plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, he was elected a member of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the party.
Communist leaders are undoubtedly impressed by Vidmanov's willingness to sacrifice his personal interests in the name of the party. So, in 1995, Vidmanov became a member of the Duma on the list of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, but refused the mandate. Imagine a Russian businessman who voluntarily gives up such a political roof as the parliament. It is also clear that Vidmanov's participation in the capital of CJSC Gazeta Pravda (other founders - the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, the editorial office of the Pravda newspaper and the Imperial Bank) did not bring him not only material, but even lobbying benefits. The newspaper worked for the party, and Vidmanov paid for it together with Sergei Rodionov, former president Bank Imperial.
The example of the APSB system shows that the communists, while persecuting well-known "Russian-speaking bankers", at the same time carefully nurture their own oligarch. The Communist Party of the Russian Federation gladly denounces the criminal acts of the reformers, but at the same time, it willingly uses the market fruits of the same reforms. Chubais and Gaidar are almost officially declared the main enemies of the Communist Party, but Viktor Vidmanov ensured and ensures the welfare of the party with the help of the very mechanisms that were imposed on Russia by liberal economists.
The question of the future of the party oligarch remains unclear. When the KPRF comes to power, Mr. Vidmanov will no doubt be rewarded with a prominent economic position in the state hierarchy. But what will happen to his empire, which has been nurtured with such difficulty and which at the same time contradicts the ideology of communism?
Tatyana Koshkareva, Rustam Narzikulov