Entrepreneur, activist, politician, phenomenon: a new book reveals what makes Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny (45) tick. In «Navalny» (Hoffmann and Campe, published August 3), three Russia experts trace the path of Putin’s most dangerous opponent. Blick is allowed to publish excerpts from it exclusively.
From now on Navalny was at the mercy of the Russian state. Before he reached the passport control desk where he would be arrested, he stopped to address a few words to the press. The background was ideal: a huge poster showing the Kremlin and the Russian flag. Navalny was still optimistic – and he was back in Russia. “This is my home,” he said. It was his decision to return: “This is the best day for me in the last five months. I am not afraid and I ask you not to be afraid either. “
After his Novichok poisoning on August 20, 2020 and his treatment in Germany, Alexei Navalny voluntarily returned to Russia. Although the well-known opponent there was threatened with arrest for allegedly violating probation conditions. His return finally made Navalny a symbol of the uncompromising struggle against the system in Russia – and above all of President Vladimir Putin (68).
Navalny stirs up the Russian system
After Nawalny’s return to Russia in early 2021, he had an approval rating of around 20 percent, while 50 percent rejected his activities. But these are averages that affect Russian society as a whole.
Navalny is a phenomenon. Young people between the ages of 18 and 24 in particular support the Kremlin critic, who has been causing a sensation as an entrepreneur, anti-corruption activist and politician for two decades.
The entrepreneur
In the nineties, Navalny was a young aspiring businessman. He made good money, but he didn’t become a millionaire. Navalny says his experiences as a businessman had a lasting influence on his political views. In Russia, he soon realized, “money grows from power”.
Navalny wants to expose Putin as corrupt. Only in this way, he hopes, will he be able to shake widespread social support for Putin.
The anti-corruption activist
In February 2011, Navalny posted a job advertisement on his blog saying he wanted to hire lawyers. The most important condition to get the job: “You really have to want to fight crooks. You mustn’t think of anything else day and night. ” Applicants had to find a “corrupt procurement contract in the tendering phase”.
Navalny is causing a stir with his anti-corruption foundation. But the activist life is not enough for him. He wants the power to change things from within.
The politician
But as a politician he had some handicaps. The first of these, paradoxically, was his reputation as an anti-corruption fighter: many thought he was a single-issue candidate. As recently as 2012, he emphasized in an article that the fight against corruption was his primary goal. “This is my economic program,” he wrote at the time. But that was not enough for many and earned him severe criticism. The second handicap was that the economic policy ideas of the Liberals did not go down well with the majority of voters – to put it mildly.
In politics, Navalny keeps changing his strategy and his positions.
At first glance, Navalny’s path as a politician seems confusing. Sometimes he has called on the liberal opposition to band together. Another time he wanted to try it alone. The same applies to elections: at times he has called for a boycott, then to support other members of the opposition and finally to protest elections. Sometimes slogans are central. Another time he rejects it as too simple. Then they will be popular again. This back and forth is not at all contradicting itself – it is merely a matter of flexible adaptations to a political system that may appear static from a distance, but is constantly changing.
In 2018, Navalny ran for president of the Russian Federation, but was not admitted due to a conviction for embezzlement and embezzlement. While the trial is still ongoing, Putin is introducing a law that prohibits previous convictions from running. Putin wins the election, which is criticized by international election observers, with almost 77 percent.
But Navalny continues.
Navalny is a liberal who has made nationalist – even racist – statements. He is an anti-corruption activist who has himself been convicted of embezzlement. He is a Russian patriot who calls for international sanctions against Russian authorities. He is an avowed democrat who leads his movement with a strong, authoritarian hand.
Who pays him?
Navalny is one of a number of young politicians who use social media skillfully and are determined to replace the old Russian leadership. The financial support is also right – thanks to Boris Simin, son of the 550 million dollar (2006) telecommunications entrepreneur Dmitri Simin.
His son Boris continued his work and promoted liberal publications such as The New Times and Meduza, but also human rights organizations such as Memorial and the Sakharov Center. And the FBK (Nawalnys Foundation for the Fight against Corruption, editor’s note). Since its inception, Simin has donated 300,000 rubles a month to the fund (that was around 3,300 euros in April 2021). Simin has also been Nawalny’s personal sponsor since 2019. He was his main source of income.
The Navalny movement is well organized. With Navalny’s return in January 2021, a video will be published that shows Putin’s secret palace on the Black Sea and is intended to prove the rampant corruption in Russia. All hell broke loose on the Russian streets. Russians protest in more than 100 cities and thousands are arrested.
The fighter
Navalny was sentenced on February 2, 2021. Two years and eight months remain in the prison camp after the house arrest has been removed. He takes the decision calmly. “Farewell, don’t be sad, everything will be fine,” he says to his wife Julia.
When his wife Julia visited him on April 13, Navalny had lost 17 kilograms. Julia Navalnaya wrote that he was “still cheerful and cheerful”. But he is weakened and it is difficult for him to speak. The newspapers to which he subscribed were censored, the old-fashioned way with scissors. He also said that in order to get him off the hunger strike, sweets were smuggled into his pockets and the other inmates were given poultry to cook in the kitchen. But Navalny wouldn’t be Navalny if he didn’t see a political lesson here about the ideology of those in power. You could not understand, he let his employees post on Instagram, that someone values ideas and principles higher than material advantages. Rather, they are convinced that anyone can be bribed to submit. But Navalny was determined to fight and ended the message with a winking emoji: “Don’t give up the important fight, either.”
But that’s easier said than done in a country where criticizing the government can be life-threatening.
In June 2021, a Moscow court banned the organizations founded by Navalny as “extremist”. Employees and supporters are no longer allowed to run for public office – many had wanted to run in the parliamentary elections in September.
On July 18 of this year, the lawyers’ organization Komanda 29 announced that it would cease its work. The Russian civil rights organization had also represented the Navalny network. The organization writes that the risk of criminal prosecution can no longer be ignored.
But the movement itself can no longer be stopped. Navalny made sure of that.
The extracts marked in italics come from:
“Jan Matti Dollbaum, Morvan Lallouet, Ben Noble, NAWALNY”.
Copyright © 2021 Jan Matti Dollbaum, Morvan Lallouet, Ben Noble
For the German-language edition Copyright © 2021 Hoffmann and Campe Verlag, Hamburg