On Wednesday Dmitry Medvedev had a meeting with leaders of seven registered parties /where four parties are represented in the parliament/, and promised to continue reforming Russia’s political space. For that, he said, a special working group would be involved in the process of improvement of political reform laws. The president’s next meeting will be with the representatives of the non-system opposition.
One the discussion's results with the party leaders was the establishment of a working group, which will initiate addendums to a package of bills on political reform, Rossiiskaya Gazeta writes. Dmitry Medvedev said that the working group should feature not only the representatives of the registered political forces, but also those who as of yet only try to obtain a political status. Vyacheslav Volodin , first Deputy Head of the presidential administration, will manage the working group.
Vedomosti in its article called “Gives Hope while Leaving” reports that Medvedev said that he “is ready to allow the non-parliamentarian opposition to the work on the political reform laws and on adding details of criminal responsibility for falsifying elections.” “This country has a young and problematic democracy with all its features, which, surely, requires improvement,” the newspaper quotes the president as saying.
One of the innovations, which Medvedev suggested on Wednesday, refers to organization of election campaigns, Nezavisimaya Gazeta reports. He said that representation of political parties in election commissions should be bigger, and that parties should have a right to revoke early their representatives in the commissions, should it be necessary.
Next week, Medvedev plans to discuss the progress of the political reform with the leaders of non-registered political parties, Komsomolskaya Pravda writes. Invitations were sent to the co-chairman of the Party of People’s Freedom /PARNAS/ Vladimir Pyzhkov, to the leader of the Party of Business and co-owner of Rostselmash Konstantin Babkin and to the leader of the Russian National Union Sergei Baburin.
Kommersant quotes co-chairman of the non-registered Party of People’s Freedom Mikhail Kasyanov as saying that the Kremlin chose Vladimir Ryzhkov from PARNAS’ three co-chairmen because “he is less uncomfortable for Medvedev and for Putin’s team.” Another co-chairman of PARNAS, Boris Nemtsov, told the newspaper that participation “in the dialogue with the president is useful,” but he “does not believe much that Medvedev, as a leaving president, may guarantee a political reform.”
Chairman of Just Russia Nikolai Levichev told RBC daily that as the president had commented on all voiced initiatives he added that he planned to cooperate in the future, too, with participants in that format. “I am not going to leave anywhere, and even more, I am going to run for presidency. And I will be happy to meet you at the debates during the presidential campaign,” he said. “I believe that Medvedev tries to demonstrate that he will remain in the politics. I cannot see big agreed plans here,” Deputy President of the Centre for Political Technologies Alexei Makarkin told the newspaper. According to the expert, “Medvedev’s major problem now is that the political class stopped taking him seriously, and he is trying to change it.”