Yekaterina Sokiryanskaya, head of the office of the International Crisis Group of Russia and a member of the Memorial Council, attended a round-table conference in Moscow yesterday and took part in discussions of Dagestan and achievements of its acting President Ramazan Abdulatipov, appointed in January.
She noted his activeness and willingness to inspect municipalities and state officials. Sokiryanskaya believes that the institutions of state power and administration were decaying and “privatized”. Corruption in Dagestan was unprecedented.
Abdulatipov focuses on reduction of municipalities, increase of tax income. He warned that heads of municipalities that fail to increase tax income by 10% would be dismissed. Dagestan had large enterprises that do not pay all their taxes, the expert said.
Abdulatipov pays special attention to education and healthcare. He admitted that teachers and doctors had low wages. Combating extremism and terrorism was one of the key aspects to undergo changes, the expert noted. She reminded that the commission for adaptation of militants was the only peaceful mechanism to disarm militants and it was shut down. The authority of the new commission was unclear. One benefit of the new commission is that adaptation will be anonymous.
The expert criticized the religious sphere of the Dagestani leader’s policy. Abdulatipov’s predecessor was encouraging cooperation with the Salafis via education programs, a football league and interaction with young people. Many madrasahs of Salafis have been closed during Abdulatipov’s rule. Sokiryanskaya said that she had visited Gimry, Khajalmakhi, Buynaksk, Khasavyurt, Makhachkala and Yuzhdag and saw religious cleansing through violations of the law-enforcement procedures.
