"Right Cause" Founded in Russia

"Right Cause" was founded largely on the basis on SPS, whose controversial disbanding drove its leader, Boris Nemtsov, a vocal critic of Vladimir Putin, to forsake the party and seek a union with Gary Kasparov. Read more about the disbanding of SPS here.

Party Founded On SPS Ruins At Kremlin Initiative May Enter Duma

MOSCOW, November 17 (Itar-Tass) -- On the ruins of the right-wing forces union SPS - at a certain point more or less influential liberal party that failed to enter parliament in the previous two elections - and two other far less significant right-of-center organizations - there has emerged a right-of-center party that may contest seats in parliament. Its organizers make no secret of the fact that the new right-of-center project is the Kremlin's initiative, but they invite everybody to take a very pragmatic attitude to it.

Protests by the irreconcilables inside the SPS failed to disrupt the project.

The three parties that have disbanded themselves - the SPS, the Democrat Party of Russia, and the Civil Force - have created a new party called the Right Cause. The unification congress was held last Sunday.

Everything was peaceful and without scandals.

In the meantime, last Saturday, not all of the three participants in the unification scheme readily accepted the idea their parties were disbanding themselves. The new party's creation was at risk, when some SPS activists revolted against self-dissolution.

The party's acting chairman, Leonid Gozman, said it was the Kremlin's condition the SPS would eliminate itself. He argued that if left on its own, the SPS would last for no more than six weeks.

"The party has a 7-million-dollar debt for the Duma campaign, there is nothing to pay salaries with, nobody gives it money, because businesses are afraid to do so," he said.

As he explained why it was so crucial to join the right cause, Gozman acknowledged that the party was being created in cooperation with the presidential staff, which he described as "a shame and disgrace." At the same time he argued "there is a chance the party may be independent." Secondly, the sole alternative to that was "political oblivion."

The most powerful argument, though, both the leader and the other delegates kept repeating on and on was this: "At the time of a crisis there soars the risk of a nationalist coup, in the meantime, no right-wing parties that could make their voices heard, are on the horizon."

"We cannot afford to abandon the country, however strongly we may hate the idea of getting stained," he said.

One of the SPS founders, chief of the Rosnanotech corporation, Anatoly Chubais, who has always been regarded as a pragmatic figure, came out for the elimination of the SPS, and made no secret of his involvement in negotiations with the Kremlin.

"We've got to try to live by a different logic, the one that is not about ourselves, but about the country. Let's try to answer the question: Russia with a right-wing party or Russia without a right-wing party?"

Kommersant quotes him as saying. "Is there a way of saving the SPS? A political party is the one that participates in elections with chances to win."

The opponents of "collaboration with the authorities" remained in the minority. A member of the SPS political council, Maria Gaidar, claimed "this is the elimination of the last independent party in the country." One of the SPS's former leaders, Boris Nemtsov, came up with a declaration, belated somewhat, though, that he was resuming his membership. He even volunteered to finance the party.

Yet, despite all of their calls, the party was disbanded by an overwhelming majority of votes.

In contrast to the SPS the DPR and the Civil Force (both held their congresses on Saturday), terminated themselves without much a do.

The constituent congress of the Right Cause voted for a party program. Protection of the interests of the middle class is one of its cornerstones. According to the Right Cause's program, "the party expresses the interests of not two dozen raw materials producing companies, but of hundreds of thousands of small, medium and large enterprises operating in the real sector of the Russian economy and expected to create the main share of the jobs in the country."

The newly-founded party has three co-chairmen - Leonid Gozman (of the SPS), Boris Titov (of the Civil Force) and Georgy Bovt (of the DPR).

The congress also named some members of the party's supreme council - Anatoly Chubais, author Marietta Chudakova, and general director of the Amedia company, Alexei Volin.

Boris Titov declared that more than a third of the new party's regional chapters will be led by local businessmen.

Gozman sounded vaguely, when he formulated the Right Cause' s strategic aim - "freedom, market, democracy." As for the near-term objective, it looks pretty clear - a faction in the State Duma.

A member of the political council, Grigory Tomchin, is quoted by the daily Vedomosti as saying the forthcoming elections to the Moscow City Duma will show, if the Right Cause has materialized or not.

"The regional elections will be rather successful for this party in one or two years to come," former SPS leader Nikita Belykh said in an interview on the Ekho Moskvy radio station.

"It will have some very good chances of collecting eight, nine, probably, ten percent of the votes, to show to the liberally-minded electorate that there is a political party it can vote for," Belykh said. "Clearly, that party would be neither independent nor oppositional."

The national public opinion studies center VCIOM has tried to find out how the average Russian sees the chances of the Right Cause. A plurality of the questioned (32 percent) said they were undecided, nearly as many (29 percent) are certain that the party is unlikely to achieve any success, and a tiny four percent said the Right Cause would eventually become the main ruling party.

In the meantime, if parliamentary elections were to be held next Sunday, the votes among the right-of-center parties would be distributed as follows - the and the Civil Force would gain two percent each, and the Democrat Party, four percent. This indicates the newly-founded party might clear the seven-percent qualification hurdle to enter the State Duma.

And, in any case, its leaders would be able to count on legislators' mandates, in view of the president-pioneered amendment to the law allowing parties that gain five to seven percent in the elections to have one or two seats in the State Duma.

"The Kremlin's decision to support this new right-of-center project would benefit all, however odd this may seem," said analyst Tatyana Stanovaya, of the Political Technologies Center. "The pragmatic ones will at last have the chance of dedicating themselves to normal political activities, and not feel afraid their print-runs of electioneering ads may be confiscated or their candidates banned from the air. As for the irreconcilables, who have established a same-name socio-political movement on the SPS basis, they will have at their disposal the brand of the no-longer existent party. True, it will not give them a chance to participate in elections. But no other radical opposition in Russia has this chance, either. Those beyond the framework of the new project will be able to preserve themselves as a stand-by political reserve."

New Liberal Party to Cooperate with Authorities to 'Make Them Better'

Moscow, 17 November (Interfax) - The leaders of the newly established party Right Cause do not conceal their contacts with the authorities but say that no-one has guaranteed them seats in parliament.

"No-one has given any guarantees and no-one asked for them," Leonid Gozman, a Right Cause co-chairman, said answering journalists' question at a news conference at the Interfax central office in Moscow on Monday (17 November).

He said that the new party is entering competition. "We will try to be successful and effective in this competition. We believe that we have a serious chance for a victory, to become a normal party that will be able to win a significant number of votes," Gozman said.

As to the contacts with the Kremlin, he said: "We have not concealed this from the very beginning of the project." "We live here, in Russia, and are not going to leave and we want people to live better in this country. That is why we cannot turn away and say: You guys are scoundrels, you are no good to deal with. We have no right to take this stand," Gozman said.

In his opinion, "one should remain critical but to ignore the authorities, to refuse dealing with them is silly, this means ignoring the reality". "The Kremlin is not an abstract place, it comprises state institutions and we need to collaborate with them," he said.

"We do not like the authorities, so let's make them better," Gozman said.