Among the candidates are head of the Russian Guard, Minister of Culture, head of the Central Electoral Commission and the governors of Chelyabinsk and Novgorod Regions.

Press Release, 8.02.2022

Photo by the Yabloko Press Service

The Yabloko Anti-Corruption Policy Centre has opened voting (https://www.yabloko.ru/lp/brush/ ) for this year’s “Zolotoy Yorshik” (Golden Toilet Brush) Anti-Award. The prizes (golden, silver and bronze colour toilet brushes) are awarded in recognition of the most wasteful budgetary expenditures by government officials. The more absurd the expense, the more likely it is to receive the Toilet Brush.

There are two categories for candidates – one federal, one regional.

At the federal level, candidates for the Golden Brush Award include:

• Director of the Russian Guard Victor Zolotov, for gun-shaped glasses, purchased at an undisclosed rate.
• Manager of Presidential Affairs Alexandr Kolpakov, for cameras and Apple computers valued at 220,000 – 600,000 roubles each.
• Former Director for the Federal Penitentiary Service Alexandr Kalshnikov, for a hunting rifle valued at 99,900 roubles, against a backdrop of torture in prisons and 46 surveillance cameras for tracking Alexei Navalny in the prison.
• Culture Minister Olga Lyubimova, for “spiritual” events conducted abroad and priced at 239 million roubles.
• Central Electoral Commission Chair Ella Pamfilova for state purchase of foreign agents markings at 13.7 million roubles, and other budget manipulations.

At the regional level, candidates for the Golden Brush Award are:

• Chelyabinsk Governor Alexei Teksler, for billiards and a restaurant for judges at 55 million roubles.
• Novgorod Governor Andrei Nikitin, for a 1,195-million-rouble waterfront, the contract was given to the city’s former mayor.
• State Expertise Depatament head Mazit Calikhov, for the purchase of a Volkswagen Touareg for 6.3 million roubles.
• Moscow Health Department head Alexei Khripun, for spending 8,700 roubles on toilet brushes and buckets, “in order to meet new clinical standards.”
• Director of the Magadan state-owned enterprise “Magadanteploset” Maxim Morozov, for the purchase of a “wireless subscriber station” – an Apple iPhone 13 Pro.

You can vote from the awards website (https://www.yabloko.ru/lp/brush/ ) or from the party’s social network pages, such as the official Telegram channel (https://t.me/APCyabloko/201 ) for the Anti-Corruption Policy Centre.

All votes received will be counted.

The final vote will be tallied on 21 February 2022.

The Golden Toilet Brush Anti-Awards were first conceived of in 2008 by young party members of Yabloko in St. Petersburg. The first award was given to then-Governor of St. Petersburg Valentina Matviyenko, for her administration’s new toilet brushes purchased for a “golden” rate.