| The Duma majority is not interested in preparing the country
for the winter. Such a conclusion should be drawn after the State Duma
failed at its first meeting of the autumn session (on September 9) to approve
the proposal from Sergei Mitrokhin,
deputy from the YABLOKO faction, to invite for the nearest "government
hour" the Chairman of the Government of the RF Mikhail Kasyanov to
report before the Duma on country's readiness for the heating season. Deputies
from pro-governmental factions, as well as from the SPS and LDPR opposed
Mitrokhin's proposal.
One of the LDPR leaders Alexei Mitrofanov said that "in a normal
democratic country, the prime minister is not responsible for stoke-holes,"
and it would be better to listen to governors and mayors on this problem.
However, Mitrokhin retorted that: "a normal democratic country does
not allow 20% of its regions to freeze in winter, as was the case in our country
last year. If the problem is so significant, the prime minister should
be responsible for this, and not the pointsmen. Smart, official reports
on successful preparations for the winter are often at odds with reality.
According to information at our disposal, poor preparations for the heating
season have been noted in the Far east, Ural, North-West and Southern
federal districts," added Mitrokhin.
The proposal from YABLOKO's deputy was supported by 160 deputies against
the required minimum of 226 votes. The following factions voted for Mitrokhin's
proposal to invite the Chairman of the Government of the RF to the Duma
to report on the preparations of the country for the heating season (in
%):
YABLOKO - 93.8% (15 out of 16)
CPRF - 93.9% (77 out of 82)
Unity - 0% (0 out of 82)
Fatherland-All Russia - 1.9% (1 out of 54)
SPS - 6.5% (2 out of 31)
LDPR - 0% (0 out of 13)
People's Deputy - 23.1% (12 out of 52);
Russia's Regions -19.1% (9 out of 47)
Agro-industrial Group - 86.0% (37 out of 43)
Independent deputies -36.8% (7 out of 19).
See also:
Housing
and Utilities Reform
| 