The Tomsk City Duma supported Yabloko with a majority of votes: Yevgeny Kaverzin maintains his mandate
Press Release 6.02.2024
Photo: Yevgeny Kaverzin / Photo from social media
Today, on 6 February, the Tomsk City Duma discussed at a closed meeting depriving Yevgeny Kaverzin, a deputy from Yabloko and a technologist at the Clean City waste recycling company, of his mandate. Such a measure against Kaverzin was proposed by the executive authorities.
By a majority vote (20 for, five against, and five abstained) it was decided to consider the issue behind closed doors. According to the results of a secret ballot, 14 deputies voted for the early termination of the Yabloko deputy of his powers, and 17 deputies voted in favour of Kaverzin continuing his work as a Tomsk City Duma deputy.
“The Duma did not agree with early termination of my parliamentary powers. I was given a warning. We continue to work!” Kaverzin said.
The head of the Yabloko faction in the Tomsk City Duma, Vasily Yeremin, was the author of an alternative draft decision: to issue a warning to Kaverzin.
“The issue of terminating the powers of our deputy was very difficult. We had conversations with colleagues in advance and talked about our alternative draft. In our opinion, representatives of [pro-government] United Russia, LDPR and New People voted against Kaverzin. I also proposed a soft option for resolving disagreements: the conflict commission had to sort out the conflicting information from the regional department and our lawyers. But the deputies did not vote for such a scenario,” Vasily Yeremin noted.
It should be noted that the regional Department for the Prevention of Corruption and Other Offenses found several inaccuracies in the deputy’s income declarations for 2020 and 2021 and proposed to the Tomsk City Duma to deprive Yevgeny Kaverzin of his mandate. Such are the methods that the executive authorities use in its fight against Yabloko’s deputy who was defending the rights of Tomsk residents infringed by the regional waste management operator.
The Yabloko faction thanks its colleagues who supported deputy Yevgeny Kaverzin and notes: if the initiators of depriving the Yabloko deputy of his parliamentary powers go to court, the party is ready to defend the right of Tomsk residents to representation in the Tomsk City Duma.
Posted: February 6th, 2024 under Elections, Environmental Policies, Freedom of Speech, Governance, Human Rights, Protection of Environment, Regional and Local Elections, Yabloko's Regional Branches.