The “Union of Right Forces” was created as an electoral bloc that united a number of liberal and democratic parties and movements (“Democratic Choice of Russia”, “New Power”, “Young Russia”, “Democratic Russia”, “Voice of Russia”, “Common Cause”) before the 1999 State Duma elections. On September 10, 1999, the Central Election Commission certified the federal list of candidates from the Union of Right Forces bloc, headed by ex-Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko, Boris Nemtsov and Irina Khakamada.

In the fall of 1999, some of the leaders of the SPS bloc supported the second Chechen war. Anatoly Chubais called it “the beginning of the revival of the army” and publicly declared Yabloko leader Grigory Yavlinsky, who proposed resuming peace negotiations with Chechen President A. Maskhadov, a “traitor”.

At the elections in December 1999, the Union of Right Forces put forward the slogan “Putin for President, Kiriyenko for the State Duma. We need young people!” The Union of Right Forces received 8.52% of the votes: 24 seats on the lists, five in the districts; in total, the Union of Right Forces faction included 33 deputies. S. Kiriyenko won 12% in the Moscow mayoral elections. (In 2000, he took the post of presidential envoy in the Volga region; now he is the head of Rosatom). Union of Right Forces leaders approved Boris Yeltsin's early transfer of presidential powers to Vladimir Putin on December 31, 1999.

February 25, 2000 at a meeting Coordination Council The Union of Right Forces decided not to nominate its candidate in the presidential elections. The presidential candidate, a member of the leadership of the SPS bloc, Samara Governor Konstantin Titova, did not receive support, which ensured Putin’s victory in the first round. On March 14, 2000, at a joint meeting of the SPS faction and the bloc’s Coordination Council, under pressure from A. Chubais, a decision was made to support the candidacy of Vladimir Putin (K. Titov was against, Irina Khakamada and Boris Nemtsov abstained).

In April 2001, the leaders of the Union of Right Forces (Sergei Yushenkov, Boris Nemtsov, Irina Khakamada), together with Yabloko, were among the organizers and active participants of the first rally in defense of NTV journalists (on Pushkinskaya Square). But Anatoly Chubais, whose comrade Alfred Koch, together with Boris Jordan, led the operation to seize NTV, supported Gazprom and Koch. After this, the Union of Right Forces, under the influence of Chubais and Gaidar, withdrew from the protest campaign, recognizing the matter as a “dispute between economic entities.”

On May 26, 2001, the Union of Right Forces party was established. Boris Nemtsov was elected chairman of the Federal Political Council of the Union of Right Forces, and Yegor Gaidar, Irina Khakamada and Anatoly Chubais were elected co-chairmen.

By mid-2002, State Duma deputies Viktor Pokhmelkin, Yuliy Rybakov, Sergei Yushenkov (killed in 2003), Vladimir Golovlev (killed in 2003), who together with Boris Berezovsky (before breaking with him in early 2003), left the SPS faction. ) radical opposition movement to Vladimir Putin “Liberal Russia”.

The SPS faction voted for government budgets in 2001, 2002 and 2003, defended the energy reform “according to Chubais”, supported the “reform” of the Federation Council, advocated reducing the length of service in the armed forces to one year and professionalizing the army.

On December 16, 2001, 6 members of the Union of Right Forces were elected to the Moscow City Duma according to a quota agreed with the mayor's office. In the gubernatorial elections in September 2003, the Union of Right Forces supported Valentina Matvienko, who acted as the “candidate of Putin” and “United Russia”.

At the end of October - beginning of November 2003, SPS leaders criticized the “security” wing of the Kremlin for the defeat of YUKOS and the arrest of Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Anatoly Chubais condemned “that part of the Prosecutor General’s Office that discredits Russian state" Boris Nadezhdin even said that it was necessary to “get rid of the president or get out of the country.” However, after Putin’s demand to “stop the hysteria,” the SPS leadership (with the exception of Nemtsov) refrained from commenting on the topic of YUKOS. Boris Nemtsov demanded a parliamentary investigation into the events of Nord-Ost. On November 21, 2003, the majority of SPS deputies voted against the 2004 budget.

SPS conducted the election campaign, positioning itself against the Yabloko party and the Rodina bloc. In the elections of December 7, 2003, the SPS list (top three: B. Nemtsov, Irina Khakamada, Anatoly Chubais, in Moscow No. 1 - Yegor Gaidar, chief of staff - Alfred Koch) received only 3.9% of the votes and did not overcome the 5% barrier. 3 members of the Union of Right Forces were elected to single-mandate constituencies (all went to United Russia).

In connection with the defeat, the Union of Right Forces congress on January 24-25, 2004 accepted the resignations of all co-chairs and elected a political council of 25 people (including all former leaders). The congress did not support the candidacy of Irina Khakamada in the 2004 presidential elections: the pro-Putin majority led by Chubais spoke in favor of free voting by members and supporters of the Union of Right Forces, which meant the right to support the candidacy of Vladimir Putin in their personal capacity.

Party leader Boris Nemtsov went into business and sports: he was the president of the Neftyanoy concern, an adviser to the President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko, and is now vice president of the windsurfing federation.

On September 16, 2004, the extraordinary political council of the Union of Right Forces adopted a special statement in which it criticized President Putin’s decision to cancel the gubernatorial elections. SPS representative Boris Nadezhdin in the Constitutional Court challenged the law that abolished direct elections of regional heads, and the Kremlin’s position in court was defended by SPS member Elena Mizulina.

On April 22, 2005, at the presidium of the federal political council of the Union of Right Forces, a decision was made to nominate the former Perm vice-governor at that time, 29-year-old businessman Nikita Belykh, to the post of party leader, and Leonid Gozman to the post of his first deputy. The alternative candidacy of Ivan Starikov was rejected. At the SPS congress on May 28, 2005, Nikita Belykh was elected chairman of the FPS of the SPS party, and Leonid Gozman was his first deputy.

In 2005, the Union of Right Forces party submitted its party lists to parliaments in 15 regions and five times - in the Ryazan, Amur, Ivanovo regions, Chechnya and Moscow - the party overcame the barrier. At a conference of the Moscow branch of the Union of Right Forces, it was decided to go to the Moscow City Duma elections on December 4, 2005, together with Yabloko and under its brand. The Yabloko - United Democrats list received 11.11% of the votes.

In 2006, former SPS activists Nikolai Travkin, Ilya Starikov, and Irina Khakamada joined the Russian People's Democratic Union (RNDU) of M. Kasyanov.

In the elections in the Perm Territory in December 2006, the SPS list headed by Nikita Belykh sensationally received 16.3% of the votes. The election campaigns of the Union of Right Forces, as in 2005, began to be led by Duma deputy political strategist Anton Bakov. The party proposed new program“Completion of capitalism”, criticized “United Russia”, put forward social slogans.

In the March regional elections of 2007, SPS lists headed by N. Belykh were nominated in 13 out of 14 regions (except for the Murmansk region). On March 11, 2007, the Union of Right Forces sent its deputies to the legislative assemblies of Samara (8.11%), Tomsk (7.78%) regions, Stavropol Territory (7.73%), and the Komi Republic (8.80%). SPS was deprived of registration in the Pskov and Vologda regions and is not registered in Dagestan. The Union of Right Forces was deprived of victory through manipulation in the Moscow 6.90 and Leningrad (6.997%) and Oryol (6.98%) regions. He performed not quite successfully in the Omsk region (3rd place, but 5.87%). In St. Petersburg, the leadership of the Union of Right Forces (Sergei Eremeev), in agreement with Governor Matvienko, waged a campaign against Yabloko; the list failed, gaining only 5.17% (in 2003 - 9.3%). In September, a change was carried out in the leadership of the Union of Right Forces in St. Petersburg, which criticized the “left of the party.” L. Gozman personally became the head of the organization.

In 2007, the FPS SPS re-registered the Moscow branch of the party, neutralizing critics of the central leadership: both henchmen of the mayor’s office and supporters of cooperation with “The Other Russia”. Moscow City Duma deputy Ivan Novitsky was expelled from the party for voting for the reappointment of Yuri Luzhkov as Moscow mayor. Novitsky moved to United Russia.

By the fall of 2007, the SPS party refused to negotiate with the Yabloko party on joint actions, and the project of unification with the Republican Party of Vladimir Ryzhkov, which was not registered, was actually frozen.

Penthouse for a cook

The Union of Right Forces (SPS) party has traveled a relatively short, but very bright path, getting into parliament exactly through the election cycle. Observers consider the Union of Right Forces to be the second ideological party in the country (after the communists), and the right-wingers themselves are the first, if only because they have changed their first person three times, while the Communist Party of the Russian Federation has never had one. This is understandable: the brand of domestic liberal reformists has shadow leadership, not public leadership. It is the “difficult credit history” of Anatoly Chubais (in Putin’s terminology) that prevents him, as well as the founder of the movement, Yegor Gaidar, from always guessing public expectations. The Kremlin, despite the continuity of its course in the economy, is often at odds with outspoken Westerners in politics.

Three sources, three leaders

The Liberal Party in the foreign sense of the word (that is, supporters of an economy free from state regulation and a policy that guards private property) may not have existed in Russia. This is if she (Russia, not the party) had not chosen Boris Yeltsin as its first president in 1991 in the publication of the former teacher of scientific communism from Sverdlovsk Gennady Burbulis, and two years later at the “Yes-Yes-No-Yes” referendum did not agree with the course followed by her government of reforms named after Yegor Gaidar from the magazine of the CPSU Central Committee “Communist” and the newspaper “Pravda”.

The country that voted for popular and democratic socialism turned out to be morally unprepared for “wild capitalism” according to a plan copied from the standard IMF macroeconomic stabilization scheme. However, a return to the state of empty counters seemed unthinkable - and with a majority in parliament of, if not communists, then certainly socialists by conviction, the country took another step towards a new social system. The founding meeting of Russia's Choice took place in the Gosstroy building, where the House of the Russian Press was then located and where the last leader of the CPSU, Gorbachev, had exiled Yeltsin even earlier.

It was the sympathy of journalists that contributed to the return in April of 1993 of Gaidar and Burbulis, who had already been dismissed from the government for a year, to the core of the confrontation between the Kremlin and the White House. The bloc’s emblem - Tsar Peter on a rearing horse - even adorned toilet lids in government buildings, which seemed to have successfully survived the cabinet of “reformer ministers in short pants”...

It was Yegor Timurovich’s list that received the largest faction in the first Duma and, if it had been possible to assemble a coalition with other democrats, it could have insisted on its own prime minister. But Boris Nikolayevich did not need a strong comrade-rival - and the party in power was left in parliament to defend the ideals and... interests of the government of Viktor Chernomyrdin. A year later, on the basis of the bloc, the “Democratic Choice of Russia” party was created, headed by Gaidar, but without administrative resources even like the one on December 12, 1993 (at that time Yegor Timurovich was the first deputy prime minister). The party was unable to overcome the five percent barrier in the 1995 race with Chernomyrdin’s “Our Home is Russia” movement.

The defeat brought Anatoly Chubais, who remained in the corridors of power, to the forefront in the ranks of the Far Eastern Republic, although he never held the main post. The leaders of the SPS (a brand promoted in 1999 around the old party) were first ex-Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko, led by whom the bloc even overtook YABLOKO on the home stretch to the Duma, then Boris Nemtsov, who only lost the 2003 elections, when he personally kept the list, and, finally, Nikita Belykh, the vice-governor from Perm, sent to Moscow to conduct campaigns in financially and politically constrained conditions.

These three leaders were never informal, but came from three sources of the Union of Right Forces: the Far Eastern Democratic Party party (Belykh, despite his seemingly young age, signed up there in 1994), the New Force movement (Kirienko) and Young Russia (Nemtsov) in its former, democratic edition.

Closest analogues

It is difficult to find an analogue of the ATP in the post-Soviet space. In Russia, unlike, say, the Baltic states, the reforms were less successful, but the people who personified them nevertheless remained in power for a long time, albeit in second or third roles. In Estonia, the author of the IME program and the “miracle” that followed the reforms, Edgar Savisaar, long ago went into opposition and now, at the head of the Center Party (!), defends, for example, the rights of Russian-speaking citizens. The party of the “Ukrainian Gaidar” Viktor Pinzenyk “Reforms and Order” entered the Tymoshenko Bloc and is about to be at the helm again. Closer in views to the domestic right, “Our Ukraine”, which ceased to be Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko, won parliamentary elections in the bloc even under President Leonid Kuchma, and as the party in power twice found itself... third. In Bulgaria, where would-be reformers also came out of the enfant terrible communist nomenklatura, there was a party called the Union of Democratic Forces. But the country was brought into the EU and NATO by the socialists and Tsar Simeon II, who returned from emigration, uniting for the good of the homeland. Where the transition to the market took place as if by textbook, the right is changing brands and leaders - in Russia, the elite sits firmly, changing their views and beliefs, but not their place near the throne.

Kaleidoscope of Sponsors

“Buy yourself some roach!” - Russian advertisers joked, mimicking the slogan of the OLBI-Diplomat company, whose boss Oleg Boyko became the top manager of the DDA party under the nominal leadership of Yegor Gaidar. However, he was still more of a fundraiser (money collector) than a sole sponsor. The class of small and medium-sized entrepreneurs, which under the “liberals” in the government quickly rose to the status of oligarchs, never abandoned their own. A new quality appeared in 1999, when the chairman of the board of RAO UES of Russia, Chubais, introduced his co-chairmen for the “just cause” (proto-SPS) Yegor Gaidar, Boris Fedorov and Boris Nemtsov into the board of directors of the monopoly. Considering that participation in this meeting was paid (Chubais, for example, at the end of one financial year became a ruble millionaire), the scandal turned out to be significant. Since then, the party’s image as a political branch of the “Chubais department”, reinforced by its presence on leadership positions both here and there, the deputy chairman of the Union of Right Forces, Leonid Gozman, is persecuting everyone, including President Putin. The current leader of the Union of Right Forces, Belykh, claims that from a financial point of view all this is not true, but few believe him. The right is in the top three wealthiest.

Hypothetical country

Anyone who thinks that they have already lived in “right-wing” Russia is mistaken. Even Gaidar was at most acting. premiere, and the months under Kiriyenko you yourself know how they ended. Decisions were made by others, and the leaders of the Union of Right Forces carried them out as best they could and adjusted them to their own benefit, naturally. The governorship in Gorny Altai of a member of the Far Eastern Republic Semyon Zubakin and in the Samara region of Konstantin Titov, who after the Union of Right Forces replaced a bunch of parties, is not an indicator.

You need to read “Freedom and Humanity” (pre-election program until 2017) to imagine a liberal society at its zenith. Description of a country with clean streets and good roads, where every honest worker receives enough to buy a home computer and dishwasher, car and vacation anywhere in the world, is not at all utopian. An industrialized state with a predominance of private property, farm agriculture and a professional army (in addition, a transport corridor between Europe and Southeast Asia) this is how it should look. The price of the issue is the rejection of paternalism. The bureaucracy retains the protection of human rights and the rules of fair play. Politically, it will be the country described in the Constitution - it will simply be filled with content. Euro of the Russian Federation, in general.

Last exit

In order not to tempt the Central Election Commission, the Union of Right Forces did not collect signatures, but paid an electoral deposit. The chance to overcome the seven percent barrier, confirmed by lists headed by Belykh in a total of one-fifth of the country’s territory, cannot be lost. The delegates even deleted the clause on raising the retirement age from the program. There has been an erosion of the traditional core of right-wing voters. “Completing Russia” collects the votes of mostly middle-aged citizens. For the “Gaidar grandmothers”, Marietta Chudakova, a regular at DDA congresses, was included in the top three, and Masha Gaidar was put at the head of the capital’s list, although it could have been the other way around - the Moscow intelligentsia knows the young lady, perhaps, worse than the famous literary critic. Chubais dropped out of the top three (they say it was he who “sank” the 2003 list). Neither Vladimir Ryzhkov nor Irina Khakamada, who lagged behind Mikhail Kasyanov’s convoy, came to the right. The faces of the campaign are Belykh and Nemtsov. In terms of views on life and privatization, this is almost “YABLOKO” (it was the assessment of the past that divided the two democratic parties), however, the only concession made by the SPS to Yavlinsky was a public promise not to “wet” sworn friends in the elections. The right is actually waging two campaigns: for provincial Russia - the populist “Completion of Capitalism” by political strategist Anton Bakov, and for Moscow and St. Petersburg the original teams of Maria Gaidar and Leonid Gozman are working with their own recipes.

Sergey Mulin

17.11.2008. The SPS did not want to die of starvation. And he died well-fed. On November 15, on the outskirts of the village of Svistukha, Khimki district, in the Olympian complex, the last, as always unnumbered, but according to our calculations, the XI (XIV) Congress of the Union of Right Forces took place. The congress met for a ritual event: “making a decision to liquidate the party and its regional branches.”[...] Scylla's report from the funeral convention, November 16, 2008. All SPS congresses.

05.10.2008. Funeral Political Council of the SPS. Almost a transcript. [...]Members of the Federal Border Guard Service, staff and a dozen guests crammed into a small conference room. The funeral service has begun. The first thing they did was kick out all the journalists. Valery Bakunin(Moscow region) tried to intervene, proposing to make the “historic meeting” open, but no one supported him during the vote. This was already a sign that the degree of unanimity among the members of the FPS had reached its highest level.
Gozman made an opening speech, asking not to quote him. [...]
The party has $7 million in debt. They must be returned by December 9, otherwise it will be very bad. The minimum maintenance of SPS costs $100 thousand per month. There's no money, so financially we are bankrupt.
We have regional deputies, people who are part of the regional establishment. We present them with a choice: heroism or betrayal. Today, SPS has no chance of passing 7% anywhere. We're unpopular, just like the rest of them. organizations in the country. We may not survive until the end of December.
[...]At the end of May, someone in the Kremlin said to someone (Gozman did not reveal their names, but from the context it was clear that we were talking about Surkov and Chubais or Belykh): “We didn’t shed blood so that there would be independent parties. Either we will destroy you, or we will have to come to an agreement." This "someone" from the SPS (let's call him Nikita Chubais) replied that he could not help but convey the conditions to the rest of the party leadership, but no one would sit at the same table with Barshchevsky and Bogdanov.
Gozman joined the negotiations at the end of September. Conditions of delivery: DPR will be represented by Bovt, GS - Titov. The Union of Right Forces has 1/3 in the Political Council, at the Congress, among the co-chairs and in the regions. Gozman emphasized that Belykh fought off all “significant, living organizations,” but could not defend everything[...] He reads out the list of regions recaptured for the Union of Right Forces - 21 pieces. In regions other than ours, “our” person is the second secretary. The Kremlin will do everything so that the party can participate in the March elections. [...]Chubais will be in the party. [...]
Party names discussed: Right Coalition, Democratic Development Party, Democratic Progress Party, Freedom Party, Constitutional Democrats Party.
[...]Gozman: I agreed to this only because Gaidar told me: “Either you do it, or nothing will work out[...] We will have to make stylistic compromises and refuse to bite the authorities.
Vote.
For - 21. Against - 1 (Bakunin). Abstained - 3 (Kara-Murza A., Korzun, Manzhikova). [...] Anton Malyavsky's Live Journal, 10/02/2008).

03.09.2008. All three right-wing pro-Kremlin parties are ready to disband. Today in Moscow the first one will pass meeting of the organizing committee for the creation of a united democratic party. This process will be led by the head of Business Russia from the Civil Power party.[and member of the Supreme Council of United Russia - V.P.] Boris Titov, from the Democratic Party - journalist Georgy Bovt, and from the "Union of Right Forces" a whole delegation has already been allocated: acting. party chairman Leonid Gozman, as well as members of the political council - Boris Nadezhdin, Victor Nekrutenko, Oleg Permyakov And Dmitry Shagiakhmetov.
[...]After three meetings of the political councils of the Democratic Party, "Civil Force" and the Union of Right Forces, held yesterday in Moscow, all three parties are ready to disband[...]
On November 15, all three parties will gather at their congresses and vote on the decision to join the new project. And if everything goes well, then on November 16 the founding congress of the new United Democrats party will take place.
[...]The party will have three co-chairs, one person from each structure[...]
two of the potential co-chairs, Bovt and Titov, are non-partisan[...]"Rossiyskaya Gazeta" - Central issue No. 4765 dated October 3, 2008.

07.2008. Mikhail Shneider. Kashin in "Russian Life" about Schneider.

13.02.2008. Letters from the European Court are being intercepted in Russia. The Union of Right Forces party appealed to the European Court of Human Rights with a statement saying that the Russian authorities are “obstructing” the Union of Right Forces in receiving correspondence from the court. As follows from the text of the statement, letters from Strasbourg stopped reaching the Union of Right Forces in the fall of last year, although until the beginning of October the messages arrived regularly, and were not related to the litigation with Russian authorities they are still coming. In particular, the party did not receive newsletters on the assignment of a registration number for two complaints regarding the party’s withdrawal from regional elections, and notification of the receipt of an emergency complaint from the Union of Right Forces in connection with “unprecedented pressure” on the party “from the authorities” during the December elections to the State Duma. [...] “These circumstances force us to assume that correspondence sent to us from the European Court is being manipulated by the Russian authorities in order to prevent the protection of the rights of our party in this judicial body,” the SPS statement says[...] "Kommersant, February 11. Full text Statements from the Political Council of the Union of Right Forces.

06.12.2007. Return of the right to the Kremlin stall suggested by one of the founders of the SPS party Grigry Tomchin in an Open Letter published on the Polit.ru website on December 5.

01.12.2007. From the librarian of the Internet library "Antikompromat" Vladimir Pribylovsky: Why you should vote for Yabloko and not for the Union of Right Forces . 1) The slogan of the Union of Right Forces in 1999: “Putin for president, Kiriyenko for the State Duma.” This slogan has not yet been recognized as erroneous by the SPS party. Yabloko has always been in opposition to Putin. Yabloko deputies, unlike the SPS, have always voted against the budget of all Putin’s governments. 2) “Apple” was always against the war, but the Union of Right Forces hesitated; in November 1999 Chubais stated: “ Russian army is being revived in Chechnya.” 3) Yabloko was in opposition to Yeltsin’s gangster capitalism, opposed loans-for-shares auctions, and voted for Yeltsin’s impeachment. SPS is still a party of Yeltsinists. 4) During the defeat of NTV, Chubais supported Gazprom - Koch and Jordana; Yabloko defended NTV to the end. In 2003, NTV undertaker Alfred Koch headed the election campaign of the Union of Right Forces. 5) SPS is not very different from United Russia. The head of the SPS election headquarters, Anton Bakov, is still a member of the United Russia faction in the State Duma: here is the official list of the faction. (Bakov is the only SPS deputy remaining in the Duma; the other four gradually defected to United Russia in 2004-2007; the last defected this summer, a member of the SPS federal political council Alexey Likhachev). The majority of SPS deputies in regional parliaments, despite the party’s alleged transition to the “opposition,” are also still members of United Russia factions and deputy groups. 6) Chubais spoke about the readiness of the Union of Right Forces to support Putin’s successor (“Vedomosti” dated 10/4/2007, “Ogonyok” dated 11/02/2006). The same is true for Leonid Gozman (Vedomosti, 06/30/2006). 7) “Yabloko” - the party of defenders environment, as a faction it includes Green Russia, which was not registered as a separate party. All deputies from Yabloko have always voted against the import of nuclear waste (SNF) into the territory of the Russian Federation; deputies from the Union of Right Forces - not all and not always. 8)Espees voted for the monetization of benefits; "Apples" were against it. 9) Although the Yabloko faction in the Moscow City Duma made an erroneous unilateral favor to Luzhkov and voted to extend his powers, nevertheless, the Moscow branch of Yabloko, led by Mitrokhin, is fighting against “infill development” and other Luzhkovism; Mitrokhin actively participates in all anti-development and environmental actions in Moscow. The Union of Right Forces is not at war with the Luzhkov mayor's office in anything. P.S.
For Yabloko, a poor party, in fact, it is essential to overcome the 3 percent barrier, on which state funding depends (unlike the rich Union of Right Forces, which doesn’t care about state funding). Note. Comment and polemicize.

07.09.2007. Stolen internal party correspondence of the Union of Right Forces (SPS) has been published. Dear Leonid! . [...]As part of the task of overcoming the 7 percent barrier by the party, the main mechanism for “collecting” votes will be the network of agitators being created. Their task, as was decided earlier and tested in elections to regional parliaments, is not to conduct campaign work, but to “buy up” votes using technology network marketing. Anton (Bakov) proposes to create it under the guise of an “anti-communist network of Committees for the Defense of Capitalism.”[...] This is an effective way of working. There is no need for a regional media campaign, no meetings with voters, which jeopardizes the agenda that the party's federal media campaign will set. [...].In the same way, Herbalife once moved into the market, overcoming the monopoly of state pharmacies.(Correspondence between Andrei Dolgov and Elena Demidova // "Vek", September 6).

05-07.03.3007. Writers for ATP: Appeal from a group of writers (Aksenov, Bitov, Gelman, etc.) with a call to vote for the Union of Right Forces; more writers (Azadovsky, Lavrov, Yasnov, etc.) for ATP.

12/18/2006. On Saturday, December 16, the next congress of the Union of Right Forces party took place in Moscow at the Izmailovo cinema and concert hall. ...the congress was the eighth according to the new style and the eleventh according to the old style. It was decided to nominate their own lists headed by Nikita Belykh at the March-April elections of legislative assemblies in 14 regions (except for the Murmansk region, where this is technically impossible); approve the co-optation of State Duma deputy Anton Bakov to the federal political council[member of the faction of the United Russia party - librarian.] and elect him to the leadership five - the FPS presidium); stop unification negotiations with the Yabloko leadership due to complete futility. The person of the congress was Anton Bakov. Delegates mentioned him almost as often as Nikita Belykh, and his own speech created a greater sensation than the speeches of Belykh, Gozman and Novodvorskaya combined. Having received the floor, Bakov stood near the presidium table, categorically refusing to comply with the request of the sound recording staff and approach the microphone. Bakov’s assistant immediately installed two portraits in front of the presidium. - Who is this? - Bakov asked. - That's right, this is Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov. Who is this? “Some Perm human rights activist,” one of the delegates suggested, but was mistaken. The second was Milovan Djilas, a disgraced ally of Josip Broz Tito, author of the book " New class" - about the nomenklatura, as the exploiter of the working people under socialism. Bakov immediately revealed the secret of the Perm victory: We said for the first time who the enemy is, why pensions are not increasing. This is the class of the nomenklatura, which has not gone away. Look at all these Luzhkovs, Rossels, Shaimievs - these are dinosaurs, this is carrion! And we have gathered here to create a party of living, normal people. The sensation of the congress was the appearance of the leaders of the Moscow branch of Yabloko - chairman Valery Bakunin and two (out of three) of his deputies - Oleg Solsky and Gennady Khryachkov, who appeared early in the morning. left their party in order to be on the regional party list of the SPS (Belykh - Nadezhdin - Bakunin - Aksenova - Tebin - Solsky...)...Belykh about the “Other Russia”: The extremist organization AKM already supports the “March of Dissent”. it doesn’t matter who to unite with, but we care. They are preparing for a revolution, and we are preparing for elections. We do not have another Russia, we have one Russia. Valeria Novodvorskaya: Elections are a very big temptation and test for an honest party, which, as an honest girl, cannot promise more than what is in nature. There are good guys in Yabloko, for example, Ilya Yashin, who hung under the bridge with Masha Gaidar. They love freedom, but besides this they need to eat something: without a liberal economy there are no liberal freedoms. One utopia has already led to the Gulag and millions of victims. You are a party of those who don’t lie; signing up for Yabloko’s program is a betrayal. These utopians have drowned too many. / [About a visit to Putin:] Should our honest, noble, innocent Nikita Belykh go to visit this lady Macbeth from Lubyansky Proezd? / Three slogans for the election campaign: “If you want to be in the EU, vote for the Union of Right Forces!”; “All progress comes from the ATP!”; especially for pensioners: “If you want to eat, you need to listen to the rightists!” Vladimir Ryzhkov(Republican Party): I hope that by the Duma elections we will have a strong united democratic party - truly strong, truly oppositional and truly democratic. ...The situation with the Republicans was explained by Nikita Belykh: in the March elections, the Republicans are on the SPS lists and do not raise the issue of renaming the party, and in the spring it will be possible to return to the topic of rebranding.(According to the head of the Rosregistration Department for Political Parties, Public and religious associations Alexey Zhafyarov, the activities of both parties are recognized as legal. The number of “patriots” is 59 thousand 412 people in 75 regional branches. The number of members of the Union of Right Forces also turned out to be sufficient: it amounted to 56 thousand 872 people in 84 regional branches (Polit.ru, August 18, 2006).

The Union of Right Forces entered the Duma election campaign renewed: with a young energetic leader Nikita Belykh at its head, a well-developed modern program “Freedom and Humanity” and confidence in victory. The Union of Right Forces is for the right of every person to live with dignity in a free country. SPS is the only party from which local candidates from our region are running to the State Duma - without “locomotives” and visiting Varangians.

Four years ago, party leaders Boris Nemtsov, Irina Khakamada and Anatoly Chubais made an honest decision and resigned, opening the way for a new Union of Right Forces. After lengthy discussions about how the party should develop further, lengthy consultations with regional branches, the right elected as its leader a young economist and politician, head of the Perm regional branch, vice-governor of the Perm region, Nikita Belykh, and developed a new program.

The Union of Right Forces has traditionally put economic issues at the forefront, believing that the correct model of the country's development, the guarantee of freedom of enterprise, highly developed industry, trade, and the service sector will automatically increase the standard of living of Russians. But it turned out that the degree of social responsibility of business in our country is still far from global standards, and a full budget does not at all guarantee an increase in living standards. Therefore, the Union of Right Forces, without abandoning its previous ideology, began to work closely on the problems of pensions and assistance to low-income citizens. The Union of Right Forces declares: there are no right or left problems, there are right or left recipes for solving them.

The ineffectiveness of the current social security system is obvious; new solutions are needed. Such decisions are set out in the election program of the Freedom and Humanity party, which immediately turned out to be in demand by voters. In March of this year, the Union of Right Forces, for the first time since 2003, won a landslide victory in regional elections, which everyone called a rehearsal for the 2007 Duma campaign.

The rightists entered six regional parliaments out of the nine they ran for. In a number of subjects of the Federation, the Union of Right Forces was openly condemned, trying with all their might not to be allowed into legislative assemblies, regional and regional dumas. People are tired of statements about real affairs that official propaganda feeds them.

They see how the national project “Development of the Agro-Industrial Complex” is undermining agriculture, knocking out farmers and small farms that had begun to get back on their feet and make their first real profit; how the national project “Affordable Housing” made the dream of owning an apartment completely out of reach for the majority of Russians. Therefore, today’s ideas of the Union of Right Forces are in demand.

The right-wing program is not a collection of comments addressed to the current government, it is a list of proposals and action algorithms that together will work to improve living standards. The Union of Right Forces is not an opposition that is always against, it is a party of constructive criticism, proposing not to start all over again, but to modernize the country so that not only state corporations and their owners get rich, but also ordinary people: workers, farmers, entrepreneurs, teachers, pensioners.

Today the Union of Right Forces speaks of the need to revive true federalism, on which Russia initially relied. The current government is diligently pulling the country along the path of authoritarianism and universal subordination to the center, hiding behind stability, indistinguishable from stagnation, oil prices and “Putin’s plan.”

“We are for the rights of the regions to be respected, including for tax revenues to be distributed between the federal and regional budgets in a 50-50 ratio, and not as it is now, when 65% goes to Moscow,” says Nikita Belykh. The Union of Right Forces is the only party that defended the right of citizens to independently elect governors in the Constitutional Court.

The Constitutional Court, understanding that the actual appointment of regional heads is contrary to the basic law of the country, did not accept the claim of the Union of Right Forces for consideration. The right demands to put power under tight control society. Under conditions of political monopoly, the fight against corruption is impossible. The rightists are not abandoning the traditional point of their program - the transition to a professional contract army.

The social block of issues has been worked out in detail, in particular the pension system, the principle of forming the Fund for Future Generations. The Union of Right Forces proposes to replenish it both from the Stabilization Fund and from the federal budget surplus. If this is not done now, the Russian pension system will collapse. The right argues: a strong state can only be based on independent, self-sufficient regions and strong local self-government.

Unlike other parties, the Union of Right Forces did not approve of the transition to proportional electoral system, when the territories lost their direct representatives in the State Duma. Therefore, party members agreed among themselves - in the State Duma, first of all, to protect the interests of those subjects of the Federation from which they were elected.

In the regional groups of the list of the Union of Right Forces there are no Varangians, who are replete with the lists of United Russia, LDPR and even the Communist Party of the Russian Federation. In the Tomsk region, only Tomsk residents are running for the right, in the Rostov region - Rostovites, and in the Irkutsk region - Irkutsk residents, and this is the principled position of the party. The list of parties in the Angara region is headed by general manager East Siberian reinforced concrete plant Vladimir Grigoriev, deputy chairman of the Irkutsk political council Sergei Bespalov and editor-in-chief newspapers "My Years" Igor Shirobokov.

These are people who are ready to defend the interests of their homeland in state level who are not going to put up with the fact that Moscow has withdrawn Irkutsk region the role of a raw material appendage, a source of filling the oil pipeline Eastern Siberia - Pacific Ocean. The Irkutsk rightists want to see their region prosperous, self-sufficient and not dependent on the whims of Kremlin officials who are willing or not to allocate handouts to the region in the form of subsidies.

The tough position that the Union of Right Forces has taken in relation to the current government has already caused a negative response in the Kremlin - the right has disappeared from the air of federal television channels. Last week, the lists of 11 parties were registered by the Central Election Commission. At the draw, the Union of Right Forces got fifth place on the ballot, but federal television channels only reported on the 10th place of United Russia, ignoring all other parties, despite the requirement of the election legislation for the media to provide all parties with equal access to airtime and print pages.

Moreover, if in September the All-Russian Center for the Study of Public Opinion, controlled by the presidential administration, gave the right no more than 1% of voter support, in October - 3.6%, then in early November the rating of the Union of Right Forces, even according to VTsIOM data, reached 5.2%. Party leader Nikita Belykh, however, is not inclined to believe official data. "If they showed good rating“, I would be scared,” Nikita Belykh admits. - This would mean that they are preparing to take us down. The main purpose of these surveys is to deceive the population.”

Indeed, it is not difficult to calculate: VTsIOM gave the right about 3% on the eve of the regional elections in 2007, in the end they received 7.5%. Consequently, if VTsIOM now estimates the party’s rating at 5.2%, it means that real voter support is at the level of 11%. IN last week October, a media campaign against the Union of Right Forces began. True, the only thing that the SPS could present was Anatoly Chubais, who allegedly finances the party and plots against the common people.

In reality, Anatoly Chubais, as the head of the state monopoly RAO UES, is a hired state manager, who has also completely withdrawn from the leadership of the party. RAO UES itself will soon disappear - on November 26, the shareholders of the state monopoly decided to liquidate it.

The Union of Right Forces sees United Russia as its only opponent, rightly believing that in the modern political space it no longer makes sense to have a discussion with anyone. There are various Kremlin projects: “A Just Russia”, “Patriots of Russia” or “Civil Power” - these are multi-colored wrappers for the same “United Russia”, designed to take away votes from the real opposition. There is the LDPR, which has been crushing the marginal electorate for 15 years and always votes in the State Duma in exactly the same way as United Russia. There is the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, which stubbornly “fights” the current government, although it does not yet understand what it wants to get as a result of its struggle. And there is “United Russia”, which, led by the president, personifies the CPSU of the 21st century.

But the United Russia members themselves, hiding behind the name of Putin and his non-existent plan, chose once again (and this is no longer funny) to abandon pre-election discussions, during which only the Union of Right Forces can ask them tough questions. The choice comes down to three options: those who are satisfied with what is happening in the country, this imaginary stability against the backdrop of rising prices, corruption and bureaucratic lawlessness, will vote for United Russia or its satellites.

Those who believe that everything can be returned 30 years ago, in the era of queues and shortages, will vote for the Communist Party of the Russian Federation. Those who want the country to move forward, its real development, will vote for the Union of Right Forces. The Union of Right Forces is the only party that unites thinking people who do not believe the plan of officials who seek to stay in power at any cost. Those who believe in the flourishing of Russia, who want to see their small homeland cozy and rich, which is respected and not wiped their feet on it, will vote for the right.

Vladimir Grigoriev, leader of the Irkutsk regional list of the Union of Right Forces

36 years old, native of the city of Cheremkhovo, from a mining family. Graduated from the Irkutsk Institute of National Economy in 1993. Chairman of the Board of Directors of the East Siberian Plant reinforced concrete structures. Married, youngest son is 2.5 years old. Lives in Irkutsk.

I am a patriot of my country, a patriot of the Irkutsk region. I was born and raised here, I want my children to live here. I am not at all indifferent to what will happen to the Angara region. A few more years of such “stability” and entire cities will begin to die out. Look: gubernatorial elections were cancelled, and the opportunity to elect deputies from territories was taken away. As a result, 65% of the income of the Irkutsk region is sent to Moscow, while everyone is silent. Moscow and St. Petersburg are competing to see who can build the most skyscrapers, and it hurts me to look at mine hometown Cheremkhovo - he is dying. And the coal that is mined there by people living in dilapidated housing is exported to China.

Taxes - to Moscow. And no one cares, everything is fine. Of all the parties, only the Union of Right Forces talks about the rights of the regions. Who will defend the interests of the Angara region? United Russia definitely won’t, they only effectively march in formation. Look who is going to the State Duma from my native region on the lists of other parties: Muscovites, Sakhalin residents, Chita residents - anyone, as long as they have money.

Will they really solve the problems of Angarsk, Bratsk, and the north? Who will delve into their concerns? Of all 11 parties that are participating in the State Duma elections, only our local ones come from the Union of Right Forces. Only candidates from the Union of Right Forces want to work in the Irkutsk region and for the Irkutsk region.

the political party unites supporters of the liberal course, people convinced that our country’s place is among civilized states with developed economies and democratic institutions. Created in 2001. One of the co-founders of the Union of Right Forces was the Democratic Choice of Russia party, which dates back to 1994. The Union of Right Forces consistently defends liberal principles in both politics and economics. The goals of the “Union of Right Forces” are the establishment in Russia of civil society and a democratic state of law, the implementation of the constitutional principles of federalism and local self-government; promoting the values ​​of democracy and liberalism. SPS is a party of reforms. Liberal economic reforms, as a result of which a unique transformation occurred Soviet economy into a market economy, in history will forever be associated with the names of Union of Right Forces members Yegor Gaidar and Anatoly Chubais. The SPS motto is “Freedom, Property, Legality”, the party anthem is “Patriotic Song” by M. Glinka - the anthem of Russia from 1991 to 2001. SPS (along with Yabloko) is the largest democratic party in Russia. The number of the “Union of Right Forces” currently exceeds 60 thousand people. Regional branches of the Union of Right Forces operate in 84 constituent entities of the federation. There are more than a thousand local party branches in the regions. Thus, the Union of Right Forces meets the legal requirements for re-registration and participation in the 2007 parliamentary elections. The governing bodies of the Union of Right Forces, according to the Charter, are: the Party Congress, the Party Council, and the Federal Political Council. General political management of the activities of the Party is carried out by the Federal Political Council and the Chairman of the Federal Political Council. Chairman of the Federal Political Council of the Union of Right Forces - Nikita Yurievich Belykh. His deputy is Leonid Yakovlevich Gozman. The executive and administrative body of the Union of Right Forces is the Executive Directorate, which is currently headed by Oleg Nikolaevich Permyakov. The SPS party owes its name to the electoral bloc “Union of Right Forces”, which, having united many supporters of democracy in the fall of 1999, successfully performed in the elections of deputies State Duma, received 8.52% and created his own faction in parliament. At the Founding Congress of the bloc on May 20, 2000, the Union of Right Forces included: the Democratic Choice of Russia party, the New Power movement, the Young Russia movement, the organization Lawyers for Rights and decent life person", party "Democratic Russia", organization "Russian Taxpayers", "Movement of the New Generation", social movements“Voice of Russia” and “Common Cause”.