A Russian Spring?

Hi everyone!

So Russia held its first session of its new Parliament yesterday in a bid for a return to normalcy and, no doubt, a hope that with the appearance of business as usual, the wind will have been taken from the protesters' sails. Mr. Putin paid lip service to some of the protesters' demands by saying he was committed to investigating and rooting out corruption, particularly in regards to business and off-shore accounts. He said he wants to make Russia an entrepreneur's dream within the next ten years. At the same time, however, anti-Putin blogger Aleksei Navalny was released after fifteen days' in jail, only to hold a news conference outside his detention center to further denounce the fraudulent elections and rally the Russian people for another demonstration this coming Saturday, Christmas Eve.  He said his detention had done nothing to diminish his ardent calls for bringing down Mr. Putin and the current Kremlin hierarchy. In fact, he said he enjoyed listening to radio broadcasts while in prison of the recent 50,000-strong demonstration in Bolotnaya Square. He wrote on his blog, "You cannot imagine how cool it was to listen to the radio broadcast from Bolotnaya." And while the people seem to be united behind Navalny's anti-Kremlin stance, there are signs that there isn't a similar unity among the leaders of the opposition. Boris Nemtsov, head of the Solidarity party, was faced with the embarrassment of having several recorded telephone conversations made public wherein he denounced some of his fellow opposition leaders as "scum" and "half-witted."

While I am dubious of the chances of any sort of Russian Spring coming into fruition in March when Putin is more-or-less guaranteed to win the country's presidency, I do wonder what would hypothetically happen if the collective opposition succeeded in bringing the government down. It is all very well and good for Mr. Navalny to rally his supporters on the streets of Moscow and motivate Russian society to come out in force in Bolotnaya or Red Square, but would the people really be all that better off if the current leaders of the opposition were voted into office? If Mr. Nemtsov and his ilk are already hurling insults at one another, how are they going to behave in the event they are voted into office?

We see this to a certain extent in recently liberated Libya. Now that Qaddafi is gone, the various rebel factions that united to reach this goal have very little in common and have in some cases turned against each other. Egypt isn't dissimilar. The military after Mubarak's oust was seen by-and-large as being an important source of stability while the Egyptian people adjusted to a new, more democratic leadership and society. But now that same source of stability is wreaking devastating havoc on the people because it has become power-hungry and is loathe to give up the power it has enjoyed. Are the Egyptians now back to square one?

Political change is always tough, especially when a country makes the transition from a one-party/one-leader hegemony to a democracy. It's human nature to want to hold onto power when it's been granted. We don't cede control willingly. For the time being, we can only hope and pray that the military will step down in Egypt and that the opposition in Russia, Mr. Navalny aside, overcome petty disputes and childish name-calling in favor of the overarching good. I fear though that this may be too much to ask.

I hope I'm proven wrong.

Ciao.

QUESTION OF THE DAY: "With Parliament back in session in Russia, are the Russian people destined for more of the same or will change really and truly come?"