KREMLIN-CREATED RIGHT CAUSE PARTY'S INTERNAL

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 MOSCOW 003090 SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/23/2019 TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM PINR KDEM RS SUBJECT: KREMLIN-CREATED RIGHT CAUSE PARTY'S INTERNAL DIVISIONS HAMPER DEVELOPMENT REF: A. 08 MOSCOW 3202 ¶B. 08 MOSCOW 3355 ¶C. MOSCOW 201 Classified By: Acting Deputy PolMinCouns David Kostelancik for reasons 1.4 (b, d) ¶1. (C) Summary: The triumvirate leadership of Right Cause has been in conflict since its establishment, with all three struggling to define the future of the party. Right Cause Co-Chair Boris Titov remains doubtful about the viability of his party in future elections, and confirmed that he is considering leaving. Fellow Co-Chair Georgy Bovt expressed disappointment with both Titov and Co-Chair Leonid Gozman, admitting he too was considering leaving the party. While Bovt and Titov agreed that maintaining the present leadership structure of the party will not bring electoral success, Gozman, in repeated media appearances, has made clear he will resist any change to the present leadership. In the wake the party's annual conference there have been no announcements of a compromise on the issue, raising suspicious that the party is at best treading water, at worst fading into irrelevance. -------------- Background -------------- ¶2. (C) Right Cause was engineered by the Kremlin (Ref A,B) from the remains of three liberal parties: the Union of Right Forces (SPS),the Democratic Party of Russia and Civil Force. Leonid Gozman was previously Acting Chairman of SPS and is well known for his criticism of the government establishment - specifically Moscow Mayor Yuriy Luzhkov. Boris Titov was and remains Chairman of Business Russia. His focus is on developing small and medium businesses, and he has little time for Gozman's political activism. Georgy Bovt is a respected political scientist who appears to have been added to the leadership only to dilute the influence of Titov and Gozman. In a September 24 meeting Right Cause Moscow Oblast head Boris Nadezhdin commented that Bovt was brilliant, but not politically ambitious. He is genuinely not interested in competing to become head of the party. Nadezhdin went on to say that Gozman, despite his ambition, could never rise to be single party head. It is unfortunate but true, he commented, that in today's Russia a man with a Jewish last name cannot lead a national political party. Both Nadezhdin and Moscow City Right Cause head Igor Trunov, in a September 18 meeting with us, agreed that of the present party leaders only Titov could take control. The last year has seen a succession of attempts by Titov and Gozman to usurp the other's influence, ending in an awkward stalemate. -------------- -- Titov's First Move: July Yabloko Merger Attempt -------------- -- ¶3. (C) In the lead up to October 11 Moscow City Duma elections Titov began negotiations with Yabloko Moscow head Sergei Mitrokhin to combine party candidate lists. Titov would head the Yabloko party list, and Mitrokhin would agree to second place in exchange for Right Cause's support in the campaign. Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported on July 13 that in order to join Yabloko's party list Titov would be required to withdraw from Right Cause for the duration of the campaign. Gozman went public with his belief that this would effectively end the party. Mikhail Vinogradov, President of the Eterburgskaya Politika Foundation, commented in the same article that, even if the party survived, Titov would clearly have established himself as head and would be able to muscle out Gozman. Moskovskaya Gazeta reported on July 21 that Gozman and Titov went to the offices of First Deputy Chief of the Presidential Staff Vladislav Surkov to discuss election strategies. Following this meeting talks with Yabloko broke down and Right Cause decided not to enter a party list in the Moscow elections. -------------- Kremlin Motives Noted -------------- ¶4. (C) Public political analysis following the decision not to combine with a Yabloko party list focused on a debate within the Kremlin as to the party's viability in the 2011 Federal Duma elections and the future of Moscow Mayor Yuriy Luzhkov. Moscow Carnegie Center's Andrey Ryabov commented July 22 that Right Cause was unlikely to earn seats in Moscow in 2009. A resounding defeat would have crippled the party ahead of its Kremlin-defined goal: earning between five and MOSCOW 00003090 002 OF 003 six seats in the Federal Duma in the 2011/2012 election cycle. Dmitriy Oreshkin of the Mercator Group commented that, as a rightwing liberal urban party, Right Cause could hardly have run in Moscow and maintained its image without strongly opposing Mayor Luzhkov. Having made the decision to keep Luzhkov on as mayor, the Kremlin decided only one liberal opposition party -- Yabloko -- was necessary to run in the City Duma elections (Note: Yabloko was prevented from winning seats in the Duma through clear fraud. End Note.). Yabloko, while often critical of city government, rarely directs attacks at Luzhkov himself. On August 28 Kommersant noted that Right Cause was the only party in Moscow which had directly criticized Luzhkov. Titov and Nadezhdin decided to run as independent candidates, but were denied registration by the city electoral commission, which Luzhkov controls. -------------- -------------- Titov's Second Move -- Take the Question to the People -------------- -------------- ¶5. (C) Titov's second attempt to take control of the party came in a September 25 call for a party congress to reconsider leadership within the party. He argued in a Kommersant editorial October 1 that the present leadership structure was only damaging the party. As Oreshkin had noted, it appears Surkov chose the co-chairs of Right Cause specifically because they have divergent agendas. From its creation the party had been unable to take a precise political stance, and therefore unable to launch a broad election platform at the local or national level. Gozman has pushed the party toward political activism, while Titov viewed this as a distraction from the real appeal of the party to business owners and entrepreneurs. Gozman and Titov have aired these disagreements publicly in interviews to national newspapers. Yevgeniy Minchenko, director of the International Institute of Political Expertise, commented in Nezavisimaya Gazeta on October 1 that the triumvirate system was not working for the party, and Titov was correct in stating that it must change. Gozman countered that, based on his July attempt to merge with Yabloko, Titov may not have the political savvy to manage relationships within the Kremlin as party head. Gozman has, until now, been successful in preventing a party congress, and with it a de facto vote of confidence on his role as pre-eminent party leader. -------------- -------------- Gozman's Counter: Associating Right Cause with Solidarity -------------- -------------- ¶6. (C) In an interview with Vremya Novosti on October 1, Gozman was unable to defend Titov's assertion that the co-chair arrangement was crippling the party. Instead, he argued that agreements were made in the context of the collapse of SPS which, although awkward, should be honored through the Federal Duma elections of 2011. This view was certainly based on a belief that his only chance to be elected in two years will come as a party co-chair. Many read Titov's announcement on the Right Cause website September 28 that "I am close to the positions of Yabloko", to mean that he is for government reform, but against direct political activism. Realizing that a party congress might be unavoidable, Gozman moved in the opposite direction. In a clear attempt to rally the former SPS base within the party, Gozman took a leading role in championing Solidarity's report on corruption in the Luzhkov government, "Luzhkov: Results." Gozman, Nedezhdin and Trunov all took front row seats at an October 18 opposition conference as Boris Nemtsov and other Solidarity leaders spoke at length about the need to directly challenge the present regime. Since that time he has regularly attended Solidarity conferences and protests. While these actions are unlikely to increase Gozman's chances of being elected to head Right Cause, they may well undermine Titov's claim to leadership and forestall a party vote on the issue. -------------- Bovt Weighs In -------------- ¶7. (C) In an October 5 meeting Bovt made clear that he is very disappointed with Titov's decision to call for leadership elections, and equally disappointed with Gozman's decision to resist them publicly. Such "airing of dirty laundry" is bad for the party. While he thought that a party congress might well confirm Titov as head of the party, Bovt called him a weak politician who demanded unquestioned loyalty. During a November 16 press conference, Bovt stated MOSCOW 00003090 003 OF 003 that while there were certainly philosophical and political differences between Gozman and Titov, it was also true that the two cannot stand each other personally. In his view, the party leadership cannot continue in its present state. Bovt said he is more pessimistic about Right Cause, and politics in general, now than six months ago. He is considering leaving the party, and predicted that electing a single leader would lead to a split in Right Cause. -------------- Titov's Ultimatum -------------- ¶8. (C) Titov began our December 11 meeting by stating that he would not be positive about Right Cause. The Kremlin Administration's central role in the formation of the party and the competing interests of its three co-chairs, guaranteed that it cannot be an effective critic of the government. He felt that Right Cause could not be a mechanism for demanding reform, but the party was uniquely placed to work with the government by providing constructive criticism, which represented the interests of middle class Russians. Titov felt that there was still a possibility of cooperation with Yabloko, though not while Gozman remained a member of the leadership. If Gozman and Bovt would allow him to pursue an agenda of cooperation with the government toward shared goals, then Right Cause might have a future as a party. If not, Titov told us, he plans to leave. -------------- Comment -------------- ¶9. (C) After a year of jostling for power, it has become clear that Right Cause cannot remain a viable contender in the 2011 federal elections with its present leadership structure. Titov made clear he is now prepared to leave the party rather than continue a fight to lead it. This will lead to a split, wherein members who support Titov's agenda of cooperation with government follow him to a new -- or another existing -- party, and Gozman and other former SPS members move toward the Solidarity movement and more outspoken criticism of the Administration. This outcome may well have been the original goal of the Kremlin when it created the party. Rubin