Notwithstanding all speculations on some contradictions between the Russian president and the premier, reports that Vladimir Putin will go to the polls 2012 as the candidate from the United Russia wasn’t a surprise. The surprise was the timing of the decision, as most of analysts thought it would be announced after the parliamentary elections.
We remember when Vladimir Putin was elected the president of Russia for the first time, when the Western media asked: “Who is Mr. Putin?” Now nobody asks this question, journalists have had enough time, 8 years, to answer it. “A powerful hand,” “a strong man of Russia,” “an autocrat,” “a law enforcement officer,” “a get-tough politician,” “the czar” are several characteristics of the Russian Premier, and soon the President of Russia, Putin by the Western media. Even though such variant of developments was expected, the return of the former president to the cabinet caused disappointment in Europe, especially among the liberals. They hoped that the current president Dmitry Medvedev would decide to go to the polls for a second term. He is thought to be more liberal than his predecessor in foreign and internal policy. Whether it is true or not is the matter of discussion: the five-day war took place, when Medvedev was in charge. However, Putin’s policy on strengthening of vertical power structure enabled him to concentrate all leverage values of running the state, and the European democrats do not like it. Strident rhetoric and the past of Vladimir Putin as the KGB officer created an image of a Soviet KGB revanchist, who won office in the risen from the ashes Russia. To tell the truth, his phrases “waste them in the outhouse” and “names, treff, surnames!” led to the expected result. “Properly, Putin took away civil freedoms, gained after the dissolution of the USSR, and established authoritarian system in the country,” Die Welt reports. The other respected German periodical, Spiegel, calls Russia The Grand Princedom, alluding to the central role and large powers of Vladimir Putin in the state.
Unlike Putin, 44 year-old Medvedev, who declared modernization of the country, has been considered as a man of new mentality and values close to European. Partially the administration of Obama counted on him too. At the moment nobody dares to say whether it was a perfect game of an evil and a good policemen or behind-the-scenes contest took place, in which Medvedev failed. However, the fact is that Putin goes to the polls in 2012.
The return of Putin to the presidential office (by the way, nobody doubted in it) caused a cool reaction in Germany, even a negative reaction. “The news is not a positive signal for complex social reforms in Russia,” the coordinator of the German-Russian relations under the government of Germany, Andreas Schokenhoff, stated to Reuter. The chairman of the committee of Bundestag on foreign ties, Ruprecht Polenz, was even more critical: “It shows that Russia is far away from an open democratic race for president.”
Inomnenie.ru published the opinion of the well-known German political scientist on Russia, Alexander Rahr: “From the Western point of view, the reshuffle seems to be weird ridiculous and non-democratic.” Rahr is sure the decision will be heavily criticized. “Everybody will understand that Putin does not simply return to office, but he has never rejected and has run the state under the president, who has been a rather poor politician,” the expert says. However, soon the West will get used to the fact that Putin is the central person, which whom they have to cooperate.
The reaction of the major Western concerns is less critical. They want to do business in Russia, the professor of the EU-Russia research centre, Eberhard Schneider, believes. According to him, they are hardly disappointed by reshuffle of the Kremlin administration. “Some of the heads of these companies would say they know Putin, know how to adapt under him, he is all-important and agreements with him are implemented,” Schneider said. The matter of whether Russia will undergo political reforms or not pales into insignificance for them, according to the political scientist. They will be probably interested only with the legal security, if we speak about modernization promises by Medvedev (inomnenie.ru).
However, parallel to the negative attitude to Putin by the West, it admits his popularity among Russian citizens. This is confirmed by the statistic data of the All-Russia Public Opinion Research Center: Putin remains the top popular politician of Russia, he has 40% of citizens’ voices. He is followed by Dmintry Medvedev with 33%. Moreover, the poll was held on September 18th, i.e. ahead of announcement that Putin will be the candidate of the United Russia. We can suppose that after the news a part of Medvedev’s voters shift to Putin, considering it is one and the same electorate group.
Despite democracy and further reforms in Russia, all other issues do not cause concern in Europe. Economy relations between the EU and Russia will be developed, especially in the sphere of enerhy, as both sides are interested in it. Thus, the authorities of Germany suspended judgment. Abendblatt reported that the press secretary of the chancellor Angela Merkel, Stefan Zeibert, said that Germany and Russia are connected by strategic partnership; the chancellor successfully cooperates with President Medvedev and will do it with any other Russian president. The presidential elections in Russia are the Russian national decision, Zeibert added. It seems we have to agree with diplomatic statement by Mr. Zeibert. Europe should accept choice of Russian people, even if it doesn’t correlate with European standards.
Orkhan Sattarov, head of VK European bureau.
