The Curious Case of Alexei Navalny

People who know Putin, know very well that he is not one to be worried about headaches. Not at least till it becomes chronic. And the jury is still out on whether the West's new mascot in Moscow, Alexei Navalny, an anti-Putin and anti-corruption blogger and activist, has turned into one or not.

Navalny normally has no dearth of glossy coverage on him. He is variously described as “Putin's bane”, “New Russia's hope”, and “anti-corruption crusader” in numerous profiles that dot western print and electronic media outlets that has helped him achieve the kind of popularity, or let's say familiarity, among a section of Russians since Putin successfully won the Presidential elections in March 2012.

However, this week was different. The 37-year-old was handed a five-year jail sentence for theft this week by a court in a provincial town several hundreds of kilometers away from capital Moscow. State prosecutors had asked the local court to jail Navalny for six years on charges of masterminding a plan to steal over 16 million rubles from a timber and lumbering firm when he was acting as an adviser to Kirov region governor way back in 2009.

It was immediately suggested by the western press that Navalny's sentence was on trumped up charges and that the process itself reeked of political vendetta by Putin. Of course, as is the norm, no evidence was presented to prove this theory. Most of the pieces was dotted with quotes from unknown western diplomats, and in a couple of cases even unnamed western bankers and plain tourists. There was no mention that the investigation in the case was going on from before Navalny came into the focus of the pro-opposition media early last year.

It was also variously suggested that Putin was afraid of him as he was planning to contest the post of the mayor of Moscow, a stepping stone towards bigger roles later. And that he was “certain” to prove detrimental to Putin's chances in 2018 Presidential polls should he decides to run for another term. In one particularly hilarious piece, it was said that Putin would be over 70 by 2024 and Navalny merely 50 and that will give the latter an advantage of age.

But let's look at Navalny's ideas and his alleged popularity in some details. First the popularity, or the lack of it.
“Among Russians who have actually heard of him (about 47% of the population) Navalny is viewed negatively by almost twice as many people (31%) as those who view him positively (16%). Think about that for a second. The hero of the opposition, the man who is supposedly going to displace Putin in the very near future, can, right now, count on the support of something like 20% of the population. Meanwhile Vladimir Putin, supposedly a political has-been, is viewed positively by more than 70% of Russians,” says Mark Adomanis, an expert on Russian affairs based in Europe.

The figures were taken by Pew polling agency. Among other things, the survey recorded 71 percent popularity for Putin, which is actually a few notches higher than the 69 percent he managed during peak recession period.
Another respected pollster, Levada Center, a non-governmental organization based in Moscow, gave even grimmer picture. While acknowledging that from April 2011 until March 2013, the number of Russians who knew Navalny rose from 6% to 37%, it revealed, much to the west's chagrin, that while in 2011 among those respondents who had heard of Navalny, 33% indicated they might vote for him for president with 5% saying they would “definitely” do so; by 2013 the corresponding figure was dropped to a dangerous 14% and 1% respectively.

There are several reasons for this. And the most important among them all is Navalny's rather shaky stances and his appetite for ultra-nationalist propaganda. In fact, he was expelled from the liberal Yabloko opposition party for colluding with the neo-Nazi movement, which, worryingly, is getting stronger by the day.

Referring to the presence of Central Asians in Moscow and them doing most of the menial jobs, he infamously wrote in his blog, “These migrants will NEVER assimilate. And neither will their children or their grandparents. The French example proves this. So, by solving the immediate problem of a lack of janitors, we’re planting a bomb under our future.”

He is also sharp enough to grab an opportunity that can be used against Putin when he sees one. For example, for quite sometime now, he is distributing a song by Tolibjon Kurbankhanov, a Tajik singer from Dushanbe, far and wide through his blog. In that particular song, the singer can be heard praising Putin. The question is, why would an anti-Putin blogger ask his readers to listen to a song that praises Putin? Anatoly Karlin, a US based Russian expert has the answer.

“Navalny exhorts his minions to spread this clip far and wide. The writing between the lines is obvious. His reasons aren’t nice and altruistic, but utterly insidious, playing on xenophobia towards Central Asians. The idea being that hearing a Tajik singing in support of Putin will hurt his standing among 'true' Russians. 'Liberal fascism' may be met with bemused grins in the US, being the rhetoric of unhinged demagogues like Jonah Goldberg, but in Russia the term accurately describes the emerging alliance between liberal Podpindosniki and ethnic nationalists, as best embodied by Navalny,” he says.

Considering Navalny's antics, it won't be surprising if he is avoided like a plague by bigger, more liberal, left-bent and otherwise, opposition movements. And make no mistake: these groups form the core of anti-Putin movement of whatever little worth of it is. Under the circumstances, it is Navalny, and not Putin, who will find it difficult to remain relevant and hence survive, in years to come. After all, one must learn lessons from what happened to once popular Mikhail Prokhorov.     

saurabh.shahi@thesundayindian.com