Activists of the party went into the streets together with thousands of fellow citizens

Press Release, 04.07.2018

Since the end of June, a protest movement against raising the retirement age in the absence of any other measures of social protection of pensioners has been growing in Russia. Yabloko was the first political party that opposed the initiative of the government, and last week activists of the party together with thousands of fellow citizens in many regions of Russia took actions against the pension reform.

The geography of protest actions is from Pskov in the North-West to Kamchatka in the Far East, and the formats of actions vary from mass-scale joint rallies with parliamentary parties and representatives of non-systemic opposition to single-person pickets and flash mobs.

A mass-scale demonstration and a rally are planned in Moscow on 18 July. One of the organisers of these actions is the Moscow branch of Yabloko. The actions will be held jointly with the Russian Confederation of Labour and a number of political parties. In St.Petersburg Yabloko will also protest together with the Confederation of Labour on 18 July 18. In addition, rallies and pickets are planned in Tula, Orel, Novosibirsk, Tambov and other cities. Below is our report on the actions that have already been held.

Pto: A rally in Omsk

One of the most large-scale rallies took place on in Omsk on 1 July. The main co-organiser of the action was the regional branch of Yabloko. According to Tatiana Nagibina, Chair of the Yabloko branch, the rally gathered more than 5,000 people.

Also on 1 July, residents of Great Novgorod went on a protest action at the initiative of the local branch of Yabloko. The participants of the action unanimously adopted a resolution demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev.

“The inefficient spending of the budget, corruption, expenses on war and costly ‘prestigious’ projects led to such a situation when the state first froze the accumulative part of the pension, refused indexation, and now decided to save money at the expense of potential pensioners who will have to look for jobs so that to feed the family,” the resolution runs.

Photo: Lev Shloshberg at a rally in Pskov

In Pskov, North-West Russia, Lev Shloshberg, leader of the reigonal branch of Yabloko amd deputy of the Legislative Assembly of the region, spoke at a rally in Pskov in favour of liquidation of the Pension Fund of Russia.

“We have two state-owned organisations financed from the state budget, which will perfectly cope with the work of the Pension Fund. The Tax Inspection collects dozens of taxes – all-Russian, regional and local, why should not they collect another duty? We have a social protection service that pays dozens of social benefits and registers dozens of millions of people who need social aid. Why on earth can not this service pay a pension and keep records of pension savings? The state is absolutely able to cope with this responsibility and with these duties,” Shlosberg said.

Photo: a flash mob in the Rostov-Don, South Russia

In Rostov-on-Don, the authorities did not give a permission to conduct a rally, so the activists of Yabloko and Civic Initiative Maria Krivenko and Anastasia Shevchenko staged a brave flash mob #PantiesOfTheProtest. The girls have demonstrate how the pension reform was robbing citizens, literally stripping them off up to the underwear.

At the protest action in Kurgan, activists collected over 1,200 signatures under a petition against raising the retirement age. Yelena Panova, Chair of the Kurgan branch of Yabloko, stressed in her speech that the pension reform was a requital for the result of the presidential election. She also added Vladimir Putin neither in his address to the Federal Assembly nor during his call-in show had said anything about the plans to raise the retirement age. It is immoral to raise one’s pensions be means of deprivation of others of their right to retire, Panova noted.

Photo: A single-person picket by the Pension Fund office in Chita, Eastern Siberia.

In Chita, Eastern Siberia, Yabloko together with Marina Sukhinina, Chair of the regional branch of the party, held single-person pickets against raising the retirement age. In addition, Yabloko appealed to the deputies of the State Duma from the region –  Nikolai Govorin, Yuri Volkov and Vasilina Kuliyeva -with an appeal not to vote for the government’s bill, and also demanded not to support the increase in the VAT rate and reduce gasoline prices.

Photo: A series of one-person pickets in Irkutsk, Eastern Siberia

The Irkutsk branch of the party also held a series of pickets. The protesters stressed that Yabloko, as always, had offered a meaningful alternative to the government’s pension reform – introduction of a minimum base income for pensioners from the sale of natural resources.

Protest actions with the participation of representatives of Yabloko were also held in Astrakhan, Stavropol, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Bryansk and other cities.