Ksenia Sobchak Can’t Figure Out if She’s a Candidate, a Journalist or Social Justice Warrior
Vladimir Putin: Wait a second, Ksenia Sobchak wants to say something against everyone. Please. Wait a bit. I'll talk about the regions later.
Ksenia Sobchak: May I? Yes, Vladimir Vladimirovich.
Vladimir Putin: Are you against everyone here or against everyone in general?
Ksenia Sobchak: No, I’m for Russians and against the irremovability of power. I have a question about competition.
Vladimir Putin: I knew it.
Ksenia Sobchak: I have a question about the competition in this election. As you probably know, I'm also going to run for President of the Russian Federation, too.
Vladimir Putin: Are you here as a journalist or did you lie to everyone, like the previous speaker, and come here as a presidential candidate?
Ksenia Sobchak: No, I didn’t lie to anyone and came here as a journalist of the Dozhd TV channel because, unfortunately, for now, this is the only opportunity to ask you a question, since you don’t participate in debates.
Vladimir Putin: You’re welcome.
Ksenia Sobchak: My question is related to the competition in the election. Your press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, has already said that the opposition hasn’t matured yet, and you said today that it's not for you to raise it because there’re no people. It seems to me that everyone matured a long time ago and nobody needs to be raised, everyone has already grown up. But the problem is different. Today, the opposition candidates either aren’t being allowed to the elections or face problems. I feel it myself.
For example, there’s the candidate, Alexei Navalny, who has been campaigning for a year already. Fictitious criminal cases were created against him on purpose. Their fictitiousness was proved by Alexei Navalny in the European Court. The Russian Federation, as you know recognizes European Court’s decisions. Nevertheless, he's being restricted from running for office, although it’s known that there’s a special opinion of the Constitutional Court on this issue and so on. The same can be said about my activities after the announcement. It’s very difficult to rent a hall in the country, people refuse to cooperate even on commercial terms. It’s difficult to supply any agitation products. All this is connected simply with fear. People understand that being an opposition member in Russia means that either you will be killed or you will be imprisoned, or something else will happen. My question is this: why does this happen? Is the government afraid of fair competition?
Vladimir Putin: I’ve already said fairly enough regarding the competition and about where we have capable opposition. The meaning of this answer is not that someone isn’t mature for something. The meaning of the answer is that the opposition should come out with a clear, understandable program of positive actions. You're running under the slogan "Against Everyone". Is this a positive action program? And what do you propose for the solution of the problems that we’re discussing today?
About the characters you mentioned. The question about Ukraine has already been asked. Do you want dozens of such, excuse me, Saakashvilis run around the squares? Those who you’ve named are the same as Saakashvili, only the Russian version. And you want these Saakashvilis to destabilize the situation in the country? Do you want one Maidan after another? Do you want attempted coups? We’ve lived through all that. Do you really want to go back to all that? I'm sure that the overwhelming majority of Russian citizens don't want this and won’t allow this.
There should be competition, of course, and there certainly will be, the only question is about radicalism. Take a look at what was done with the Occupy Wall Street movement. Where is it now in the US, the Occupy Wall Street movement? There were Saakashvilis or those you mentioned, it consisted of them. Where are they now? They are gone. Is it democracy or not? Let's ask ourselves, what is democracy? This is the subject of quite a serious and profound discussion. I assure you, the authorities weren’t afraid of anyone and aren’t afraid of anyone. But the power shouldn’t look like a bearded man who idly digs cabbage out of his beard and watches the state turn into some muddy puddle from which oligarchs take out and catch goldfish for themselves, as it was happening in Russia in the 1990s and as it’s now happening in Ukraine.
We don’t want the second edition of today's Ukraine for Russia, do we? No, we don’t want it and won’t allow it.