Jukos and Russia

Remove all ads!

Now when all the eyes seem to be turned towards the western giant USA I think it's time we turned our heads to the sleeping and battered colossus of Russia which is desperately struggling with domestic problems. I'm sure we've all heard about the Jukos scandal and I would like to hear some oppinions about it.

Here the media seems to think that it's all about resocializing the oil production and I find it a bit worrying. In my view Russia is taking slow but steady steps out of democracy, exactly to what direction from there I'm not sure but I'm damn certain it won't be good. How has the media in your country reacted on the Jukos scandal and what are your oppinions about it? Links to articles about the subject would also be more than welcome.

 

Well, I am sure I am not as well informed as most Europeans on domestic Russian affairs...but I watched a television show about how Putin had jailed a big-time oil oligarch. Apparently, the man was making very public demonstrations of insubordination including purchasing a television network devoted to anti-Putin propaganda. That man is in jail now. Is that Jukos? Or was that the journalist who was shot?

I have heard Putin is centralizing power...not necessarily in Moscow but in the man himself. I don't think Joe-Six-Pack (of vodka) is pleased with democracy as it has turned out with a Russian face.

 

The way I understand it, Russia has yet to see democracy (or at least the thing commonly called democracy by westerners), but that's perhaps not the main subject here.

I've been led to think that when the USSR fell, all assets previously owned by the state suddenly became prizes for whoever was bold enough to claim it. Hence, the oil industry in particular has been "hijacked" by individuals like the Loukos dude. A decade of that medecine has effectively turned an industrialised Russia into what looks more and more like a third-world country in some regards: exporting raw-material, colossal debt, huge and rusty military...

Now that Putin dude is playing a Bonaparte-after-the-directorate of sorts and centralising power that has been lost to the mafia fifteen years ago. Heck, having some kind of central power might be a good thing; even if it borders dictatorship I say it's better than letting the mob rule a country full of nuclear weapons.

Of course, my not living in Russia makes my opinion an outside one as well.

 

From what I have read, Putin is playing with a double-edged sword. On one hand he is reforming the old laws coming from the age of CCCP and Stalin, but on the other he has muted all TV channels and papers, threatening free-speech and free-economics of a arising country. It might be that he is intending only to bring more power to Moscow, or then he might just wishing to become another Stalin. One thing is sure, though; he seems to be a rather ruthless when it comes to achieving his goals, for good or bad.

I'm certain it will be for bad if he "arranges" yet another victory for himself in the president "election."

 

I actually think that Putin is the right person at the right place at the right time. Just what Russia needs. And that's maybe just because I don't hold Russia in high regard and don't see a bright future there. I don't think there is anything communist about what Putin does and nothing democratic (or only in a very reluctant way) either. At least sober, stern Putin is a lot better then that alcoholic and a little bit unstable Jelzin, at least in my eyes.

But as I am convinced that democracy needs a broad majority of people with professional skills to work. And I don't think Russia has enough of those. Except for places like Putin's home St. Petersburg, where a local democracy would be (and is as long the state doesn't interfere) able to work. And I think in lots of others cities. So, it all boils down to something like a new tzardom with a small, mighty aristocracy and lots of serfs. I think the amount of day-labourers is frightening and that looks to me like serfdom already in my book. An inheritance of the bad economical shape the country has been in the 90ies.

As for Jukos. It seems to me a struggle among the oligarchs and a step to solidify Putins power. As my understanding is, that Jukos in the end started to support a party that's competing with Putin and like-minded oligarchs. Now, if there would have come anything good from Jukos' side, I don't know. I don't think that the whole possessions of Jukos in the end fall to state, if it's getting dissolved, I suppose it's possessions going to be divided among the other Russian big companies.

Edit: My English sucks.

[ August 05, 2004, 00:56: Message edited by: Iago ]