“On Stalin’s schedule”: Mishustin re-appointed as prime minister
The Russian State Duma today reconfirmed Mikhail Mishustin as Prime Minister. This marks the first time the Duma has exercised its authority to approve candidates for the position of Prime Minister and members of the government, in accordance with amendments to the Russian Constitution.
Everyone voted "yes" except the Communists, who criticized the government's financial bloc. They thereby undermined the statistics cited by Garry Minkh, the presidential envoy to the State Duma, according to which only one parliamentary faction supported the government in 2020, while Mishustin's recent report was universally approved in the Duma.
Mishustin's candidacy was submitted to parliament by Russian President Vladimir Putin at 4.59 am (this was announced by speaker Vyacheslav Volodin).
This time seemed “mysterious” to the liberal St. Petersburg political scientist Mikhail Vinogradov.
“Not only were the deputies not allowed to think overnight, but they weren’t even allowed to properly brush their teeth, almost like during a night search. The introduction procedure showed that the prime minister enjoys the absolute support of the president. But he won’t tell anyone about this out loud. An ideal event: everyone is free to interpret what is happening in their own favor. And all this will be true,” Vinogradov wrote in his tg channel.
For his colleague Maxim Zharov, the nomination at dawn, on the contrary, inspired romantic metaphors.
" The candidacy was added to Stalin's schedule , at the end of the night, when dawn was already breaking, and the timid rays of sunlight were replacing the pitch darkness. Perhaps this symbolic approach to an otherwise entirely routine and expected process was the entire point of the plan being implemented. Now Mikhail Mishustin will become the prime minister of the morning and the rising sun, and by this very fact he will be expected to personify the coming changes, which, of course, have yet to be outlined and the path to them paved," Zharov wrote.
He also recalled that exactly 118 years ago, at the first session of the 1st State Duma of Russia, then Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin uttered his famous words that “ they need great upheavals, we need a great Russia .”
Mishustin received mostly praise in parliament today. Vyacheslav Volodin recalled that the government had achieved an increase in the Russian budget from 21 to 36 trillion rubles in 2020. In response, the prime minister requested a list of government members who weren't answering calls from deputies and promised to deal with them. He also assured that Russia would become one of the four most economically developed countries by 2030.
Experts welcomed today's appointment. Political scientist Sergei Markov noted that Mishustin had implemented a rapid and effective digitalization of public administration and ensured the rapid development of the military industry. He praised Mishustin for his lack of " personal political ambitions and a political clan ," as well as for his "general smoothness ."
His colleague Alexei Chesnakov believes that by introducing the candidacy of the old prime minister to the State Duma, the president sent several important signals.
“Demonstration of stability and continuity. Transformations as evolution. Improvement, not a radical change in the political paradigm. Refusal to update for the sake of updating. A positive assessment of the work of the previous government is given. A positive assessment of the prime minister’s work style is recorded,” writes Chesnakov.
“Mishustin has enough common sense not to even try, at least outwardly, to pretend to start his own big political game. There is not a single rumor that he can lay claim to the role of successor, which in these times only increases his chance of long-term political survival. All of the above characterizes Mishustin not at all as a person without ambitions, but precisely as a person who knows how to hide them and act in accordance with common sense, which led to his relatively peaceful reassignment without unnecessary intrigue,” says liberal journalist Ekaterina Vinokurova.
“Mishustin is the prime minister of an obscure time, which is still ongoing, and therefore it was clear in advance that the prime minister would not be changed at the crossing. And where to put the whole Mishustin? Not an ambassador to Cyprus. Having carried out a slight rebalancing among deputy prime ministers and some ministers, in general the president leaves the same configuration of the government that existed throughout the last Covid-war years,” writes another liberal, Ilya Grashchenkov.
Energy expert Boris Martsinkevich, on the contrary, understands the global challenges that time poses to the prime minister.
“Russia faces the final crossing from “Europe from Lisbon to Vladivostok” to realizing itself as a civilization. No, well, really - how long can you pretend to be just a country? It is also important that the crossing itself is reliable, and not hastily put together from, I’ll say, sticks,” he wrote.
Political observer for the Tsargrad TV channel Andrei Perla foresees that the composition of the government will change, and is dissatisfied that this is happening so late.
“In general, of course, only in Russia can the first “responsible government” be formed during the days of the Northern Military District. Neither earlier nor later, namely in the third year of the battle,” writes Perla.
Political scientist Igor Skurlatov predicts that only a few ministers will be replaced. He is much more interested in the supposedly upcoming changes in the presidential administration.
“Well, we, the people of Russia, are waiting for an offensive at the front. Powerful and decisive. Without agreements and carrots, with either recognition or non-recognition of the Satanist and leader of the Ukrainian junta Zelensky as a terrorist criminal “on the run.” With the annexation of Kyiv and all of Little Russia to the Russian Federation. We are waiting for real economic reform to lift people out of poverty. We are waiting for the eradication of migrant flows with import substitution of Russians and other indigenous ethnic groups of the country. We are waiting,” writes Skurlatov.
English version :: Read in English "On Stalin's schedule": Mishustin re-appointed as prime minister