Boris Vishnevsky’s speech at the Federal Council of Yabloko on 30.11.2024, published on 1.12.2024

Photo: Boris Vishnevsky / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service

Dear colleagues,

The conditions in which we work today are like swimming against the current in sulfuric acid. This is exactly how the party of peace and humanism has to work now.

We are working in a situation where the nature of political struggle has fundamentally changed. Dissent has been criminalised, and disputes with opponents of the government, discussions, programme development, and election competition have been replaced by criminal or administrative cases, searches, arrests, putting [the government’s] opponents on discriminatory lists, and depriving them of their voting rights.

Nevertheless, it is necessary to engage in politics even in such conditions.

Because there are many people who disagree. They must see politicians who represent their interests. Who are capable of “political empathy”. Who are on the side of citizens and are ready to stand next to them, helping them fight for their rights. To see politicians who say out loud what citizens think, but do not dare to express. Who are ready to have an honest and open conversation with citizens – about the present, about the future and about the past, without understanding which it is impossible to build the future.

I have to note that the authorities are diligently destroying part of the memory of the past. Why are monuments to victims of political repressions being attacked, why are memorials being dismantled or damaged, why are The Last Address plaques being dismantled [from the houses where victims of repression lived]? It is done so that nothing reminds us that the government’s decisions to persecute citizens can be criminal, and those who were persecuted can be innocent. So that people do not think: maybe the same thing is happening now? They are trying to erase the memory of past repressions in order to justify the current ones.

Yabloko is categorically against political repressions and repressive laws. When changes begin – and they will definitely begin – a general restoration of human rights in Russia will be necessary. Because there is not a single article from the Second Chapter of the Constitution on the rights and freedoms of man and citizen (as you may remember, Yabloko was once called the “party of the Second Chapter of the Constitution”) that has not been violated by the authorities, and with impunity, because the court does not restore violated rights, but, as a rule, legalises their violation, especially in “political” cases.

It will be necessary to repeal all repressive laws that contradict the Constitution, diminish or limit the rights of citizens, including freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom of conscience, freedom of assembly, and freedom to participate in government: the laws on punishment for “fakes” and “discrediting”, laws on “foreign agents” and “undesirable organisations”, and others. With simultaneous – as was done by the 1991 RSFSR law “On the rehabilitation of victims of political repression” – rehabilitation of all those convicted or fined under “political” articles. And, what is important – with bringing to responsibility all those who organised and carried out political repressions. Otherwise, everything will repeat again, as it did after 1991, when many of the democrats demanded that a “witch hunt” not be allowed, and in the end, as I warned then, the witches went hunting.

We need to restore parliamentarism in full – the parliamentarism that existed in our country in the early 1990s, but was consistently destroyed. Based on my 13 years of experience in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, I can say that today the situation in our city is fundamentally different from what it was thirty or even twenty years ago. We observe how a city parliament – and this applies, certainly, not only to St. Petersburg – has been transferring increasingly more powers to the executive branch, and turning into an obedient executor of its commands. But those who, like Yabloko, oppose this are in the obvious minority. However, we must understand that the parliament, controlled by the executive power, cannot and will not oppose the adoption of laws violating the rights of citizens. Political reform is needed. The balance of power must be restored. A new Constitution is needed – many of provisions [of such news Constitution] Yabloko proposed back in 2020.

It will not always be like this: changes in the country are bound to happen. As practice shows, they can start completely unexpectedly. We must be prepared for them, and we must do everything we can to bring them closer. Our task, the task of the party of peace, humanism, and freedom, is to try to bring the dawn closer during the gathering darkness.

The final thing. A necessary – although not sufficient – condition for change is obvious: a ceasefire. So that they stop shooting and start talking.

Approaching this should be the main thing in the work of every Yabloko member in Russia today.