The celebrations and the procedures to designate the candidate for the 2024 presidential elections began. Uncertainty regarding the future role of the historic re-founder Zjuganov, lukewarm about the attack on Ukraine. Russian communists try to “rebuild a virginity” patriotic.
Moscow () – The communists of the KPRF party are preparing for the solemn celebrations on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the refoundation, on January 21, 1993, after President Yeltsyn dissolved the Soviet CPSU the previous year. The central act is the rally in Red Square, with the floral offering in the Lenin Mausoleum, which will begin an intense political season.
Indeed, the program has already been announced. In May, the plenum of the Central Committee will issue very firm directives in favor of patriotic education and the fight against Russophobia inside and outside the country. In December, the party congress will be held to choose the candidate to run in the 2024 presidential elections, and very heated discussions are already taking place on the criteria for defining the candidacies.
Events to commemorate the 30th anniversary began at the beginning of the new year, with the meeting of the All-Russian Committee for Social Protest Actions, convened by party vice-president Vladimir Kashin. The main events correspond to the “sacred” dates of Russian communism: the anniversaries of the birth and death of Lenin (April 21 and January 21) and Stalin (December 21 and March 5) and Victory Day, on May 9.
Several perplexities arise with respect to the participation of the party’s re-founder and first secretary, Gennadij Zjuganov, whose absence at the event on December 21 remained unexplained. Party leaders had announced and then canceled an important meeting on February 13 in Snegiri, Moscow province. It is Zjuganov’s birthplace and residence, where the KPRF introduced its new leadership on February 13, 1993.
It would give the impression that they want to sideline the “patriarch” Zjuganov for his tepid support for the military operation in Ukraine, and Kashin announced a large online conference on February 14 with the participation of 40,000 party members, dedicated to the celebration of the refoundation. On February 17, after the official meeting of the leadership, a concert will be held in the Hall of Columns of the “Soyuzov Dom” in Moscow. The first vice-president of the Central Committee, Jurij Afonin, denied that a meeting had been scheduled in Snegiri and in any case “the dates of the refoundation are sacred and cannot be a reason for discord. Zjuganov will undoubtedly be present.”
Delegations from abroad and the participation of prominent figures from the current leadership of the country are also expected, but so far the organizers have not given names. Afonin insists on the “work” nature of the events, and there will be assemblies of the regional sections to elect the delegates who will participate in the meetings in Moscow, especially the one in the Hall of Columns, where the 1,200 seats must be filled. the living room. The plenum against Russophobia will be “an effort in favor of the entire Russian society”; not only a patriotic assembly, but “an expression of all the people.”
In reality, the purpose of these redundant celebrations clearly seems to be the attempt to “rebuild a patriotic virginity” ahead of the presidential elections, getting rid of the navalist “useful vote” that in previous years had involved many communist candidates, albeit with poor results. In any case, it will be difficult to erode support for the pro-Putin majority, but the communists want to be prepared for possible turnaround scenarios, which cannot be ruled out given the uncertainties of war operations in Ukraine.
Kashin proclaims that “2023 will be a very difficult year for our country, but the KPRF will work hard to defend the rights and interests of workers.” There are also plans for the presidential candidacies to be approved by a “popular vote”, a kind of primaries of the left that were already partly tested with the online vote of 2017. At that time, the leader of the Sovkhoz “Lenin” won. , Pavel Grudinin, who did not come from party membership, and this time the scheme could point to an even more popular leader.
