On Wednesday, the State Duma deputies voted for stripping United Russia deputy Alexei Knyshov of a deputy mandate, after the detectives found that he combined business activities with his deputy powers. He was not even invited for a State Duma meeting, at which this issue on the agenda was debated.
The inquiry was initiated against Alexei Knyshov and several United Russia deputies over his possible business, after A Just Russia member Gennady Gudkov was stripped of a deputy mandate, the Novye Izvestia daily recalled. The State Duma Committee for control over the reliability of the information about the incomes of deputies headed by Vladimir Vasilyev has considered the involvement of eight deputies in business activities. The suspicions were lifted from all of them, except for Knyshov. The Russian Investigation Committee confirmed that the then deputy Knyshov has worked as a member of the board of directors of the commercial organization Inbister s.r.o. from September 2010 to August 30, 2012. As a result Alexei Knyshov filed an application for the early termination of his deputy powers, but the lawmaker does not plead guilty, noting that he did not run a business during his tenure as a deputy.
The Russian Communist Party assumes that former candidate for Bryansk governor Vadim Potomsky and coordinator of the faction Anatoly Lokot are the next in line for the stripping of deputy mandates, the Nezavisimaya Gazeta daily reported. In any case, head of the legal service of the Communist Party Vadim Solovyev did not rule out such turn in the events. Although the United Russia deputies began to say that the procedure for stripping the deputy of his mandate should be spelled out and even pledged to amend the law so that the deputies will not have any problems with their former business, but they do not intend to do it now, but a little bit later.
Another pressing problem of corruption was raised at a plenary meeting of the State Duma on Wednesday, the Rossiiskaya Gazeta daily noted. State Duma Speaker Sergei Naryshkin believes that “the officials should not be suspected constantly of future abuses.” “Acting like this we only alienate and oust from the public service decent and highly qualified specialists. It is much more important to know where the roots of these problems are. Without such analysis and without making the system of the public service stronger all the rest will be another Sisyphean toil,” Naryshkin said, noting that “the corruption problem is obvious for everybody.” “The corruption is flexible and multifaceted and takes place not only in the system of public and municipal services, but also in the business sector and other spheres,” the State Duma speaker said.
The Vedomosti daily noted that former State Duma deputy Alexei Knyshov who refused from a deputy mandate has the work, as his company has won a contract to build a road to the tune of 7.5 billion roubles. The Donaerodorstroy company, which is owned on the parity basis by Knyshov and two his partners, was found a winner of an auction of the Transport Ministry in the Rostov Region for the construction of a 19-kilometre Rostov-on-Don-Azov highway, the newspaper reported with the reference to the website of the state purchases. For the victory in the auction Donaerodorstoy just had to reduce the initial price by one percent and the company gained a contract for 7.428 billion roubles.
The newspaper also recalled that Alexei Knyshov was elected in the State Duma on December 4, 2011, on the Rostov-on-Don list of the United Russia Party and stated about the placing of his Donaerodorstroy stake in management. On Wednesday, the former deputy noted that he cannot comment on the auction, because he has not participated in the Donaerodorstroy direct management for about a year, but any won contract is a profit for the company.