Minister of Regional Development Viktor Basargin went to Nizhny Novgorod Region last week to personally monitor post forest fire situation on site. Governor of the region Valery Shantsev started his second term by appointing two new deputy governors to supervise investment policy and communications. Read more in the weekly review of events by FederalPress.
Minister of Regional Development Viktor Basargin went to Nizhny Novgorod Region last week to personally monitor post forest fire situation on site. Governor of the region Valery Shantsev started his second term by appointing two new deputy governors to supervise investment policy and communications. Read more in the weekly review of events by FederalPress.
Post forest fire situation
Minister of Regional Development of Russia Viktor Basargin visited Verkhnyaya Vereya town in Nizhny Novgorod Region. Minister said he was satisfied with the speed of construction of new homes for people who lost their property in forest fire this summer.
All works are made in constant dialogue between the authorities and local dwellers, Viktor Basargin pointed out. Nizhny Novgorod Region suffered much damage accounting for one third of all losses from forest fires in Russia this year. All levels of state power in the region proved to be able to deal with the situation and quickly respond to the acute needs of suffering territories.
Meanwhile, prosecutor service checked out fire safety services in Vyksunsky territory of the region where fires were very severe, and started a criminal case of negligence against local fire safety services. There were no proper water sources ready for use in case of fire.
Governor’s team
Governor of Nizhny Novgorod Region Valery Shantsev started his second term in this position and appointed six deputy governors last week. During his first term the governor had only four deputies.
Two new deputy governors are Dmitry Svatkovsky (investment policy department director), and Vadim Ivanov (director of the department for international, external economic and interregional relations).
Vice-governor and the first deputy chairman of the regional government is Vladimir Ivanov.
Valery Shantsev also established two new structures in the government – regional ministry of sports and youth policy, and department of information technologies, communications and mass media.
Municipal elections
Regional minister of industry and innovations Nikolai Sataev attracted attention of local mass media with his pre-election adventures. Nikolai Sataev lost in the primaries within his party, United Russia, but decided to participate in the municipal elections in Nizhny Novgorod as an independent candidate.
However, several days passed and the minister withdrew his name from the list. He decided to follow the party’s rule and governor’s orders and set aside.
Elections of deputies to the City Duma of Nizhny Novgorod will be held in October this year. United Russia put forward 6 candidates for each of 28 single mandate districts of the city.
Municipal elections will also take place in the second largest city of the region, Dzerzhinsk.
Elections in Dzerzhinsk are much louder this year due to the fact that the city refused to cancel direct general elections of mayors. So, alongside with Duma deputies people will elect city mayor. This year 10 candidates will compete for the mayor’s seat including current mayor of the city Viktor Portnov.
Shaking multi-party system
Regional Duma of Nizhny Novgorod passed new amendments to the regional election protocols in two readings. Changes suggest that the threshold for political parties to get seats in the Duma is 7%. Smaller parties can receive one deputy mandate if they collect less than 7% but over 5% of votes.
Alexander Kotyusov, Fair Russia member, comments that his system goes against strategy defined by the Russian President. Dmitry Medvedev expressed worry about many local Dumas become single-party bodies. Therefore legislative changes must promote the idea of multi-party representation. There are seven legally acting political parties now. To let them all to Duma means reducing threshold of passing down to 3 percent.
Kotyusov’s opinion gained supporters among right and left wing parties. But opposition forces did not have enough power in Nizhny Novgorod Regional Duma, and the law was passed and will cast its effect over future elections.