Press Release, 19.07.2018

On 19 July, State Duma deputies in the first reading supported the bill to raise the retirement age: 328 votes in favour and 104 – against. Before the plenary session, activists of Yabloko picketed the entrance to the State Duma building with a demand to dismiss the bill. Protest actions will continue until the parliament abolishes the adoption of the law. Such a promise was made by Sergei Mitrokhin, one of the participants in the action and member of the Federal Political Committee of Yabloko:

“The law is predatory. The state puts its hand into our pockets. They took from half a million to several million roubles from each future pensioner,” he said. “The country disposes of huge raw materials resources, and it sells these resources to the right and to the left, and money goes to offshore. Why not to use resources to fill the pension fund, as it is done, for example, in Norway? Then we would have come to the State Duma to welcome the adoption of such a law. The World Cup has passed – there is pretext for refusing to give permissions to us for mass actions any more, and we will continue to protest. We will call all to come to the Federation Council, and to the President’s Administration. And we will disrupt the adoption of this barbaric law. ”

Meanwhile, Yabloko leader Grigory Yavlinsky called on State Duma deputies who voted against the pension reform, to step down in order new elections of the State Duma are appointed:

“They fail in economic issues. Sanctions, the war in the Donbas, Syria, corruption – that is why they take from the people all they can for the sake of their self-preservation and irremovability. Oil money now goes to the arms race. Why do they have to think about pensions? Let those who voted today in the Duma against raising the retirement age, abandon their parliamentary mandates. If 104 deputies leave the Duma, then there will be new Duma elections. Then we’ll see,” Grigory Yavlinsky proposed.

Photo: Sergei Mitrokhin and Boris Kravchenko, leader of the Confederation of Labour of Russia

It should be noted that today’s action Yabloko held jointly with independent trade unions representing the Confederation of Labor of Russia. Mitrokhin noted that the party and the trade unions had established partnership relations “on the battlefield against raising the retirement age.”

This time the police did not interfere with the picket participants. However, on 19 June, Sergei Mitrokhin was detained for conducting an absolutely similar action by the State Duma and was subsequently fined by a decision of the Tverskoi District Court for 20,000 roubles. The court ruled out that Mitrokhin had allegedly violated the decree of President Putin prohibiting protest actions by 25 July.

This time the Moscow branch of Yabloko received a response from the authorities of the Central Administrative District of Moscow running that there was no need to get a permission for single-person pickets for 19 July. This letter convinced the police that this time the action was legal.

However, earlier the city authorities refused to give Yabloko a permission for a demonstration and a rally, as well as a series of 33 pickets in the centre of Moscow. A similar situation has developed in St. Petersburg. However, the party conducts actions in a number of other regions. In particular, today the Novgorod branch of Yabloko conducted a protest action.