Nikolai Rybakov on Radio Free Europe 17.01.2020

On January 16, Yabloko Chairman Nikolai Rybakov took part in the Facing the Event programme hosted by Yelena Rykovtseva. The guests of the studio – Sergey Obukhov, former State Duma deputy from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, Mikhail Fishman, journalist from the Dozhd television channel, and Mikhail Kasyanov, former Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, – discussed the appointment of Mikhail Mishustin as Prime Minister, what Russians can expect after amendments to the Constitution are adopted and the irremovability of power announced in the President’s Address [to the Federal Assembly].

Nikolai Rybakov: The most important thing is that the listener has just said [about the new Prime Minister] that he is a symbol of change. Certainly, he is not a symbol of change, because there are no changes, there is cementing of power. And the person was chosen proceeding from the fact whether he is able to guarantee this cementing of Putin’s power and guarantee that it will continue after 2024, rather than depending on whether he plays hockey or tennis. And not only Putin’s personal power, but also that of the clans around him, the group. And this man, obviously, is able to guarantee it.

Yelena Rykovtseva: Two people are already telling us that this [Presidential] Address, all these changes that are being introduced into the Constitution, are aimed at preserving Vladimir Putin forever. So I want you all, everyone, to express your attitude to this opinion. And how exactly do these amendments keep it forever? Nikolai, do you agree that they are designed for this?

Nikolai Rybakov: So I, as a matter of fact, I have voiced it already, as skaters, pianists and actors who are joined together in the commission for amending the Constitution will tell you. Well, there is a number of completely incomprehensible phenomena. For example the State Council. Well, they used to gather and would have go on calmly gathering together. But someone decided to fix it in the Constitution. It [the State Council] is a completely unclear body – where it will fit in, what powers it will have. And perhaps this will be the Chairman of the State Council with powers that are not yet clear to us, which [pianist] Denis Matsuev will play for us later. But why is all this being done? In general, if you combine the first part of the Address and the second, I would say this is a disaster.

I agree that there should be free breakfasts [in schools] in the country where there are 20 million poor people, there should be free breakfasts, but for the poor, and not for everyone. But they did not think about it at all. It is impossible to breathe life into national projects, it is impossible to do it, because they are absolutely stillborn, they have no content which would be carefully thought over.

Now they are masking the entire situation in the country. The Constitutional Court is actually destroyed. Because if the President appealed to the Constitutional Court before signing the law, and the Constitutional Court made a decision, officially deciding that this law is constitutional, then the citizen can no longer appeal [to court] about this law, because the Constitutional Court has already said that it is constitutional. Plus, the President gets, along with the Federation Council [the upper chamber of the parliament], an absolutely controlled possibility to dismiss not only the judges of the Constitutional Court, but also the judges of the Supreme Court, which is generally outrageous. Russia really needs reforms, but they must evolve exactly in the opposite direction. Why is there consolidation of presidential power? Because it means the President’s control over the judicial system.

Mikhail Obukhov: Which has not been there before.

Nikolai Rybakov: But now this is being fixed, because the President will be able to dismiss judges. How could they think about such a thing! The worst thing that has been done in the whole system is that they propose to consolidate in the Constitution that we no longer recognise the supremacy of international law. That is, that decision of the Constitutional Court was not enough for us; now they want to write it down in the Constitution, which many parliamentarians are also happy about. That is, in fact, this is close, if we do not call it a constitutional coup d’etat, in any case it is very close to it. Perhaps, after some time, when we find out what this commission will really come up with, then perhaps there will really be a statement that this coup has occurred.

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