Corruption

Anatoliy Serdyukov file photo

Date: Thu, 15 Nov 2012 15:36:14 -0500
From: Patrick Armstrong <gpa@magma.ca>
Subject: [UTExpertsDiscGrp] RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP 20121115

RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP 15 November 2012

CORRUPTION. There are those who believe that one of the main reasons for Putin’s re-appearance in the President’s chair was that only he has the political muscle to really move on Russia’s widespread problem of corruption, especially corruption at the top. I have always said that we won’t know that the anti-corruption drive is serious until it takes down someone in an office near Putin’s or Medvedev’s. Do we start to see this? The OboronServis case is getting bigger. The case concerns skulduggery with the extensive number of military properties. Some charges have been laid and the inquiry has been widened.  Last week Putin dismissed Defence Minister Serdyukov (that’s an office pretty near his) and some think that there is a connection and there is a hint in Putin’s words that there is (although, naturally, there are plenty of other theories too). Sergey Shoygu, the popular long-time Emergency Services Minister (Governor of Moscow Region since April) was appointed to replace him. The Chief of the General Staff and other senior military were also replaced shortly after and others today. It’s true that Serdyukov was very unpopular with the generals but Putin had kept him on nevertheless upon his return. Another possible scandal that may emerge involves the defence industries which many accuse of being only able to make ineffective weapons that are also very expensive. On the heels of this comes another scandal in another important and celebrated enterprise: the Russian GPS system GLONASS. For some years it has been promising more than it has delivered and now a case charging embezzlement has been opened. The chief designer of the system has just been fired. These are corruption scandals in important and prestigious parts of the state structure and are therefore much more momentous than another bent cop discovered somewhere in the sticks. More coming maybe. I would observe that, in my opinion, the worst corruption in Russia involves privatisation: public property being transformed into private gain; both of these fit that category.

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