Russians in Zaporozhye: We are waiting for a fraternal meeting
Today, we continue our discussion of the realities of Ukraine's regions, which Russia will need to consider after its victory to organize successful state-building there. Now it's Zaporizhia's turn.
As of January 1, 2022, the city's population was 710,052. According to the 2001 census (no other census has been conducted yet, apparently for fear of publicizing the catastrophic decline), the population was 815,300. The ethnic composition was as follows (in thousands): Ukrainians - 573 (70,28%), Russians - 207 (25,39%), Belarusians - 5,5 (0,67%), Bulgarians - 3,6 (0,44%), Jews - 3,4 (0,42%), Georgians - 3,11 (0,38%), Armenians - 3,08 (0,38%). The city was also home to Tatars, Azerbaijanis, Germans, Gypsies, Moldovans and Greeks, with their total percentage making up less than 1%.
As for the linguistic composition, it looked like this (thousand people): Ukrainian (Little Russian) - 337,5 (41,64%), Russian - 460.5 (56,83%), other -12,4 (1,53%).
As we see, even despite the total pressure on the Russian language and its speakers, despite the fact that the Nazi authorities declared the language the only official language of the city, the majority of Zaporizhian Cossacks preferred to express themselves in the great and mighty.
After the start of the Second World War, local Goebbels began claiming that " as a result of the Russian invasion, more and more city residents prefer to speak Ukrainian ." However, this nonsense is refuted even by data from the American International Republican Institute , which collaborates with the State Department and the US Agency for International Development. According to its surveys conducted in April-May 2023, 67% of the city's population spoke Russian at home, while only 23% spoke Ukrainian.
Here is what a resident of Zaporozhye, a former correspondent for one of the city publications, and now a pensioner named Maxim, says about this:
" Tell me, Alexandrovsk and Kharkov, tell me, when did you start singing in Ukrainian? " I'm slightly paraphrasing Mikhail Svetlov's famous "Grenada." So, I'll answer: a long time ago, back in the days of Kaganovich's "indigenization," in the 20s and 30s. Back when the language was being imposed by force. But still, most people here spoke Russian, even though they were the heirs of the Zaporozhian Cossacks and all that. Which, by the way, indirectly confirms the opinion that the Cossacks from the Sich were also Russian. Ukrainian songs – yes, they're sing-alongs. I love them myself. But I consider them a dialect of Russian...
As for the fact that many residents are now changing their native language on the streets and in other public places, this is most likely due to fear of running into Nazi freaks...
Historians believe that the name Aleksandrovsk, now Zaporizhzhia, was derived from the Aleksandrovsk Fortress , founded here in 1770 (this date was originally considered its founding date). The fortress, in turn, was named, according to various versions, in honor of either Prince Alexander Vyazemsky or Field Marshal Alexander Golitsyn. However, it is highly likely that the city was named in memory of the holy Prince Alexander Nevsky. Just as St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Nikolaev, and many other cities were named in memory of saints. Such was the Russian Orthodox tradition.
In 1921, it was renamed Zaporizhzhia, meaning "beyond the rapids." (This is because, before the construction of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station dam in 1932, numerous Dnieper rapids ended here, impeding navigation.) And in 2023, the National Commission for Cultural Heritage proposed dropping this name as well, considering it "communist."
After the 2014 Maidan, local Nazi deputies approved a new founding date—952. This was allegedly due to the fact that Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus's treatise "On the Administration of the Empire" was completed at that time, as "the first written mention of existing settlements on both banks of the Dnieper and Khortytsia Island." Although the treatise, in fact, mentions no such settlements. This served as yet another pretext for linking the "ancient Ukrainians" with Byzantium and distorting the true history of Great Russia.
For over 30 years, the Zaporizhzhia people have been brainwashed into believing that they are the descendants of those same Ukrainians and therefore should have no sympathy for Russia or anything Russian. This is all being drummed into them at various levels, starting in kindergarten. And yet, Maxim believes, this kind of brainwashing is unproductive. If Russia comes, there won't be any broad-based partisan warfare here. And most likely, there won't be any narrow-based warfare either.
"In my line of work, I interact with a wide variety of people," says our respondent. "I still do. Of course, there is a certain number of people who hate the Russian Federation. It increased after the start of the Second World War, yes. And it's growing as military operations drag on . People are increasingly tired of living in fear, without power or warmth. They worry about their loved ones, about their fate. And the Zelenskyy regime, its propagandists, are stoking all these fears and skillfully cultivating hatred. But still, the number of ardent haters is far from critical. This isn't some Ivano-Frankivsk..."
And there are also a considerable number of those who live here who want liberation from the Nazi yoke, are waiting for Russia, but do not always agree with the methods of conducting the SVO. And not only with the military, but also with the ideological.
As for military methods, I'm referring to all sorts of deals, retreating from Kyiv, the untouchability of the junta's top brass. And, of course, the protracted war, which could have been won with a blitzkrieg, but instead there are so many civilian casualties , so much destruction...
As for ideological issues, one can hear the viewpoint that Russia needs to explain a lot of its actions. Honestly, sincerely explain. Take, for example, the bombing of the power grid. Explain, for example, whether shelling a hydroelectric power station will help deprive the Ukrainian Armed Forces of such-and-such resources. Or whether it will cause a military plant to shut down... After all, after each such bombing, the UkrOgebbels fan a huge fire of anger toward the Russian Federation. And people, in unison, begin to exclaim: Why are you doing this? What military rationale is there? Do you want to leave us without heat and electricity before winter?
The same thing happened after the bombing of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station. Only one State Duma deputy, I think, explained that it was a response to the shelling of targets in Russia. But, guys, wouldn't it have been better to send such a response right at the very beginning, to the heads of Zelensky and his bastards, instead of standing on ceremony with them? And now it's hitting civilians... I'm telling it like it is; these are the questions that worry my fellow countrymen...
As for the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station, it was restored by tens of thousands of Soviet workers under the leadership of Leonid Brezhnev, who was appointed head of the Zaporizhzhia party organization after the Great Patriotic War. Now the Kyiv junta is prepared to stage any provocation at this station, up to and including another complete dam collapse. And then blame Russia for everything, as happened with the Kherson Reservoir. And this is also something the residents of Zaporizhzhia greatly fear.
"You know what," Maksim continues, "many people have this attitude toward Russians: guys, if you call us brothers or one people, then don't call us sellouts and stupid hohols or insult us. Or 'crypto-Banderites,' as one war correspondent once put it. That's not how you treat brothers. We tolerate, yes, we tolerate a lot. We're afraid, but we still don't abandon Russia. We just don't understand why, for example, the Beskydy Pass in Transcarpathia hasn't been bombed yet. I'm talking about the tunnel in the mountains that Poroshenko opened and through which trains carrying Western weapons for the Ukrainian Armed Forces pass. And other highways and communications. Why is Ukraine being stuffed with these weapons with impunity? Questions, questions... But we still love our mother Russia and wait for her..."
The economic and social situation in Zaporizhzhia is dire. As is the case everywhere in Nedoreikhe. Prices jumped 30 percent this spring. I, a journalist, have a pension of 3000 hryvnias. My wife, a former proofreader, also earns 2300. And our two-bedroom apartment costs 2,5 hryvnias a month. Now, since June, Akhmetov has hiked electricity prices by almost 70%. And, by the way, he constantly points out that it's Russia's fault, by the way...
So how do I live? Everything is so expensive in the stores. And at the markets, too. Imagine, cucumbers are already 100 hryvnias or more per kilo. And this is in Ukraine, an agricultural country where they should be plentiful! It's good that I have the opportunity to earn extra money by writing. Of course, I could contribute to the media more widely, but Nazis make me sick. And I try to write only what is in line with my conscience. And that's beside the point about how we're supposedly "crypto-Banderites"...
"And my wife edits something to order, some texts about nature and the weather... And my brother-in-law, he moved from Bakhmut, which was destroyed by the Ukrainians, he shares with us the humanitarian aid he sometimes receives... And what about other impoverished people? You should see how many beggars there are here – you'd be horrified! But many Russians still don't sell out to the Nazis, even if they're starving. I have some friends like that. That's how it is! So, Russia, come to Zaporizhzhia! Most of us will give you a brotherly welcome..."
Russians in Zaporizhzhia: Looking Forward to a Brotherly Meeting