Strident anti-corruption advocate under palpable threat of official vendetta

Most of Navalny’s accusations against the state corporations could be true, because, being a minority stakeholder, he is privy to some of these corporations’ top confidential financial performance documents and core and non-core activities that objectively highlight their operations, and most importantly, the final destinations of their traditionally undeclared financial proceeds from such operations. 

Specifically, Navalny, citing data at his disposal, dropped what was tantamount to a timed bombshell last November, when he accused the former management of the state-owned pipeline company, Transneft, of embezzling at least $4bln during the company’s construction of its high-profile East Siberia-Pacific Ocean pipeline. Similarly, he has also attacked VTB, Gazprom and other corporate embodiments of Kremlin’s version of so-called ‘state capitalism,’ accusing them of corruption, financial mismanagement, incompetence and corporate waywardness. 

“Navalny has ruthlessly criticized Transneft, VTB, Gazprom and other corporate embodiments of Kremlin’s ‘state capitalism,’ accusing them of corruption, financial mismanagement, incompetence and corporate waywardness.” 

To fully liquidate or at least contain some of these excesses, Navalny, a lawyer turned into one of the nation’s most famous blogging social activists, has recently set up a special website, titled, Center for the Protection of Shareholders, fully dedicated to enlightening potential investors on the real modus operandi of today’s Russian capitalism and the key players pulling the strings in the nation’s economy.

Frontal attacks against Russia’s business and political elite

Speaking about the today’s Russia’s tightly controlled political system, Navalny was also equally blunt, calling the ruling United Russia ‘a party of crooks and thieves,’ noting that the political system is so weakened by corruption that the nation’s political leadership could within five years face an Arab Spring-like revolt or other forms of so-called ‘color revolutions’ that  had swept through several countries over the past decade, if the Kremlin’s current iron grip on the political system remained completely intact. “If those in power today do not voluntarily start to reform themselves, then there is a very high possibility of such revolutions occurring in Russia. Besides, there is such a fragile balance between the elite’s divergent interests that any unexpected significant event could destroy this balance within a twinkle of an eye.”

The anti-corruption crusader also noted that the abundance of petrodollar windfall that Russia generates annually, thanks to its position as one of the world's biggest producers of natural resources, will enable the current leadership to alleviate the social factors that usually ignite public revolt, and thus postpone the occurrence of such public protests, but such situation cannot last forever. “The increasingly rising, but currently still mostly latent discontent over endemic corruption and stagnation in society life are sure routes to social turmoil and public disorder, as already evident in the full blown crisis hotspots across Russia’s North Caucasus region. 

In his signature caustic criticism of the local economy, he noted that corruption has eaten so deep into the current economic system that there are now two parallel economies in the country — the official and shadow one, with the latter amounting to at least 20% of the nation’s official economy’s annual GDP, or about $300bln per annum. He blamed the nation’s elitist political and business leaders for the poor state of affairs in the economy. “Corruption is the foundation of contemporary Russia, the base of the nation’s current political system and those running it.”

Expectedly, such blatant frontal attacks against the nation’s political elite and corporate establishment could not neither endear Navalny to government bureaucrats, most of whom had  been direct targets of his anti-corruption whistle-blowing activities, nor the private business owners or CEOs of influential state corporations that have equally been frequent victims of his caustic blogging corporate activism and objects of his barrage of litigations aimed at gaining legal accesses to their companies’ bookkeeping and other vital accounting documents. 

Global recognition of blogger’s activities on local bureaucrats

It is, therefore, not surprising that Navalny’s strident one-man anti-corruption advocacy activities have received fully deserved applauds from mainstream Russians, who have donated millions of rubles into his Rospil project, an-Internet portal for pooling evidences of corruption among state officials and corporate ineptitude among the nation’s business elite, with some citizens giving as little as 10 rubles in what they see as a route to the ‘alter of needed competitive pluralism in national politics, social justice and economic fairness in the country.’ Similarly, he has also received accords on the international arena, with Time Magazine calling him ‘Russia's Erin Brockovich’ in 2010,  while Yale University has inducted him a fellow in its World Fellows Program, a project aimed at creating a global network of emerging world leaders, etc. 

However, completely oblivious to Navalny’s activities are top Russian government bureaucrats, who appear to have consciously turned ‘blind eyes’ to the poignant contents of his publications or blog materials on corruption and corporate irresponsibility in the country. This ‘official blind eye’ does not mean that Navalny has been totally left untouched by the government and its agencies over his relentless criticism. For instance, in March, his blog came under premeditated cyber attacks that later threatened to compromise the functionality of the whole of Russia’s Internet. 

He has also been unceremoniously summoned for questioning over his use of Russia's double-headed eagle coat-of-arms on his website, which the investigators have called ‘desecration’ of a state’s official symbol. Here, the bone of contention is that the golden eagle on the blogger’s site clutches two handsaws, instead of an orb and scepter, in its talons in a symbolic reference to the way bureaucrats embezzle state funds via sharing them among themselves at the expense of the general public.

All these recent negative developments have been minor distractions till May, when the authorities decided ‘enough was enough,’ and came down heavily on the blogger with a backdated controversial charge of swindling a regional state timber company of $35,000 via a fraudulent scheme, a charge that carries a real prison term. The charge has been widely described by Western media as ‘a state vendetta’ and ‘a baseless fabrication orchestrated by the Russian security services’ by the accused. 

Joining in the ensuing public debate melee were former Yukos executives, Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev, who are both currently serving jail terms on economic charges, who noted ‘there cannot be better way to shut a critic’s mouth than bringing up criminal charges against him. Advising Navalny to consider exile to avoid prosecution and real prison term, the fallen oil magnates, acting on their personal experiences with the state, said ‘such a move will be ‘in the best interests of your campaign and your personal safety and also because there is no chance of really securing serious anti-corruption successes from a pretrial detention facility.’

“Corruption has eaten so deep into fibers of the society that Russia now has two parallel economies — the official and shadow one, with the latter amounting to at least 20% of the nation’s GDP or about $300bln per annum.”

Besides, Navalny’s opponents have also learned some of his tactics, as they have engaged in an information propaganda war against him, with some even calling him a Western puppet, a sort of ‘an agent-provocateur’ on Western powers’ payrolls specially tasked to attack Russia and its key political and economic assets, hence his ‘unjustified attacks’ against the nation’s topmost political and business leaders. Expectedly, the anti-corruption crusader has denied all such charges in their entirety, calling them ‘pure fabrications’ by his foes in the political and business circles aimed at turning ordinary citizens against him, and thus forcing him to stop his activities or contemplate over going into a self-imposed exile abroad over concerns for his  personal security and safety. 

Navalny a new dilemma for the government 

Today, Navalny’s current dire dilemma seems to be a predetermined outcome. This is more so, especially as the political campaigns for the December parliamentary election are now in full gear, following Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s setting up of the National Front Movement to consolidate his flagging United Russia’s chances in the poll as well as putting the party’s presidential candidate — likely to be Putin or incumbent Russian President Dmitry Medvedev — in a pole position in the presidential election next spring. Thus, someone (or a group of persons) higher above in the political power structure has deemed it expedient that the endless flows of accusations —both true and false — against United Russia and state-owned corporations — both being Kremlin’s pet projects — could do more damage to the nation’s current political authorities than the anti-government activities of both official and unofficial political oppositions in the country combined.   

And, this is why the official approach to this issue raises vital, albeit rhetorical question: Is this the right and only way to really assess the contents of Navalny’s activities and don’t the allegations made in his publications against both bureaucrats and business elite — who have come to view themselves as ‘members of an untouchable caste in the country — deserve serious reviews by law-enforcement agents with the goal of indicting those involved in the alleged crimes, if the accusations turn out to be true or indict Navalny for false accusations and defamations if they turn out to be fabricated. 

This is a straight-forward issue, the more reason why the government has decided to take a highly convoluted stand on this case that will probably make Navalny another political martyr beats any imagination. But one thing is crystal clear, and that is going after the prominent whistleblower with a prehistoric vendetta for his legal activities in a country that lays claim to modern civilization and democratic values is wrong, as it is akin to fighting one’s mirror image. The problem, according to this ancient axiomatic truth, is not with the mirror, but with the reality that it objectively reflects. And, the solution is also equally obvious: change the reality and the image reflected by the mirror will also change. 

In our case, the government needs to change the current status quo in the political and business environment by making it fairer for all citizens, so that our mirror — that is Navalny and his likes — will no longer have anything bad to write about or justifiably criticize the state for. Understandably, and quite unfortunately, the same result will be obtained by putting him in jail on frivolous charges or silencing him physically through various clandestine operations. But their social outcomes and political resonances in and outside Russia will be totally different. The Kremlin ought to make its choice, and to the unbiased observers, the better of these two choices is more than obvious. 

And, that is going after Navalny with an official vendetta aimed at closing his mouth and anti-corruption activities in business and politics is a wrong approach to solving all the social, economic and political issues raised in the whistleblower’s accusations. Arresting him, or in a probable worst case scenario, killing him as his supporters now fear, will not make the accusations disappear or right the wrongs mentioned in his various speeches, publications in the press or on his numerous Internet-based sites. Instead such draconian actions will rather embolden those that have become accustomed to being members of the so-called ‘untouchable caste’ in the Russian society. 

Narine Adamova took part in proofing of this text.