Mikhail Kasyanov
Encyclopedia
Mikhail Mikhailovich Kasyanov - (born 8 December 1957) was the Prime Minister of Russia
from May 2000 to February 2004.
He is the leader of the People's Democratic Union
and an ex-member of the opposition coalition "The Other Russia
".
on 24 February 2004 after more than three years in office.
During this term Kasyanov’s government made serious breakthroughs in launching and successfully finalizing reforms in many areas of the Russian economy and public sector – tax and fiscal reforms, customs reform, pension reform, reorganization of the national infrastructure (energy sector, railways). Inflation was reduced significantly and the Russian economy grew by almost one third. At the same time, the urgent policy of economic diversification had just started and was not fully implemented.
On the first anniversary of his dismissal (24 February 2005) Kasyanov gave a press conference at which he said that he might run for president in the 2008 elections. His bid was tentatively supported by billionaires Leonid Nevzlin
http://www.newsru.com/russia/03mar2005/nevzlin.html and Boris Berezovsky http://www.newsru.com/russia/11apr2005/berezovsky.html (both in exile after corruption indictments against them in Russia) and former chess champion Garry Kasparov
.
In April 2006 Mikhail Kasyanov was elected Chairman of the People’s Democratic Union (PDU), a newly launched NGO. PDU was one of the co-founders of the first "The Other Russia" conference http://www.theotherrussia.ru in July 2006 and of the "The Other Russia" coalition that was set up at the conference. Kasyanov and the PDU were actively involved in the coalition's work and took part in the Dissenter's Marches
http://www.namarsh.ru in Moscow and St.Petersburg – the first protest manifestations in many years. On 3 March 2007, Kasparov and Kasyanov spoke against Putin's government to thousands of supporters at the Saint Petersburg Dissenters' March. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/04/world/europe/04russia.html
At a presentation in International Institute for Strategic Studies
26 June 2006, Kasyanov criticized Putin's administration. He said:
"Separation of powers has been effectively demolished and replaced by the so-called ‘Vertical of Power’ which is based on the false idea that all the meaningful social and political processes must be kept under control by the state. The government and parliament cannot function any longer without daily instructions. The judiciary is increasingly servile. Independent TV does not exist any more at the federal level and is being quickly uprooted in the regions. Moreover, the state-owned companies and the state itself increase their grip over the electronic and printed media. Responsibility of the regional level of power is totally destroyed by the abolishment of direct elections for the governors."
By 2007 PDU had regional branches in 75 regions of Russia http://nardemsoyuz.ru/regions/. In June 2007 Kasyanov was nominated by the PDU as a candidate for the presidential elections. In September 2007 the new political party People for Democracy and Justice
(:ru:Народ за демократию и справедливость) was established on the basis of the PDU, and Kasyanov was elected its chairman.
. Kasyanov left (opposition group) The Other Russia
in July 2007 due to the group's failure to agree on a single presidential candidate. Kasyanov was nominated as a candidate in December 2007 and on 16 January 2008 he stated that he had finished collecting the 2 million signatures necessary to run as a candidate. http://www.gazeta.ru/politics/elections2008/2008/01/15_a_2558316.shtml Later in the month, however, the Central Election Commission rejected his candidacy on the grounds that 13.36% of the signatures were invalid. Kasyanov claimed that the decision to prevent his candidacy was taken by Putin himself, and he described the election as a farce, calling for a boycott.
The presentation of his book "Without Putin" the Ukrainian capital Kiev
was cancelled on 18 December 2009. Kasyanov's press secretary claimed that the electricity went out in the Premier Palace Hotel minutes before the presentation was to start and that some 20 young men had blocked the entrance to the hotel to keep attendees from entering.
, the allegations are described as credible, and a Spiegel
article from 2007 notes that Kasyanov insists that his only earnings as a public servant was his government salary and he was only involved in one private business venture since leaving the post of prime minister. The same article also claims that Kasyanov purchased the state-owned dacha
of former Communist Party of the Soviet Union
ideologue Mikhail Suslov
which was worth several million Euros.
On 11 July 2005, the Russian Office of Public Prosecutor started to investigate the privatization of two houses formerly owned by the government. According to allegations first made by the journalist and State Duma
member Aleksandr Hinshtein http://www.hinshtein.ru/cgi-bin/3publication.pl?nomer_novosti=65, two luxury government houses had been put up for sale in 2003 by a Kasyanov decree. According to the court verdict of 16 March 2007, he was to return a house and pay 108,135,000 rubles in damages to the government for using the property illegally (approx. USD 4,150,000 or €3,130,000). In 2007, Kasyanov was still planning to appeal. http://www.newsru.com/russia/16mar2007/kasjanovdacha.html
Prime Minister of Russia
The Chairman of the Government of the Russian Federation The use of the term "Prime Minister" is strictly informal and is not allowed for by the Russian Constitution and other laws....
from May 2000 to February 2004.
He is the leader of the People's Democratic Union
People's Democratic Union (Russia)
The People's Democratic Union is a liberal opposition political party in Russia. Member of opposition coalition The Other Russia. The party was founded by former Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov after he failed to win the leadership of the Democratic Party of Russia...
and an ex-member of the opposition coalition "The Other Russia
The Other Russia
The Other Russia , sometimes cited as Another Russia, is an umbrella coalition that gathered opponents of former President of Russia Vladimir Putin...
".
Political career
The last member of the Russian government closely associated with Yeltsin, Kasyanov was dismissed, along with the entire Russian cabinet, by President Vladimir PutinVladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin served as the second President of the Russian Federation and is the current Prime Minister of Russia, as well as chairman of United Russia and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Russia and Belarus. He became acting President on 31 December 1999, when...
on 24 February 2004 after more than three years in office.
During this term Kasyanov’s government made serious breakthroughs in launching and successfully finalizing reforms in many areas of the Russian economy and public sector – tax and fiscal reforms, customs reform, pension reform, reorganization of the national infrastructure (energy sector, railways). Inflation was reduced significantly and the Russian economy grew by almost one third. At the same time, the urgent policy of economic diversification had just started and was not fully implemented.
On the first anniversary of his dismissal (24 February 2005) Kasyanov gave a press conference at which he said that he might run for president in the 2008 elections. His bid was tentatively supported by billionaires Leonid Nevzlin
Leonid Nevzlin
Leonid Borisovich Nevzlin is a Russian-Israeli businessman. Nevzlin was a high ranking executive at Yukos, once a Russian oil firm before it was extinguished by the Russian government. That government is requesting his extradition due to hotly disputed criminal allegations against him and other...
http://www.newsru.com/russia/03mar2005/nevzlin.html and Boris Berezovsky http://www.newsru.com/russia/11apr2005/berezovsky.html (both in exile after corruption indictments against them in Russia) and former chess champion Garry Kasparov
Garry Kasparov
Garry Kimovich Kasparov is a Russian chess grandmaster, a former World Chess Champion, writer, political activist, and one of the greatest chess players of all time....
.
Dissenters March
The Dissenters' March was a series of political opposition protests that took place on 16 December 2006, in Moscow, on 3 March 2007, in Saint Petersburg, on 24 March 2007, in Nizhny Novgorod, on 14 April 2007, for the second time in Moscow and on 15 April 2007, again in Saint Petersburg, on 18 May...
http://www.namarsh.ru in Moscow and St.Petersburg – the first protest manifestations in many years. On 3 March 2007, Kasparov and Kasyanov spoke against Putin's government to thousands of supporters at the Saint Petersburg Dissenters' March. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/04/world/europe/04russia.html
At a presentation in International Institute for Strategic Studies
International Institute for Strategic Studies
The International Institute for Strategic Studies is a British research institute in the area of international affairs. It describes itself as "the world’s leading authority on political-military conflict"...
26 June 2006, Kasyanov criticized Putin's administration. He said:
"Separation of powers has been effectively demolished and replaced by the so-called ‘Vertical of Power’ which is based on the false idea that all the meaningful social and political processes must be kept under control by the state. The government and parliament cannot function any longer without daily instructions. The judiciary is increasingly servile. Independent TV does not exist any more at the federal level and is being quickly uprooted in the regions. Moreover, the state-owned companies and the state itself increase their grip over the electronic and printed media. Responsibility of the regional level of power is totally destroyed by the abolishment of direct elections for the governors."
By 2007 PDU had regional branches in 75 regions of Russia http://nardemsoyuz.ru/regions/. In June 2007 Kasyanov was nominated by the PDU as a candidate for the presidential elections. In September 2007 the new political party People for Democracy and Justice
People for Democracy and Justice
People for Democracy and Justice is a new Russian political party, established in 2007. The party leader is former Russian prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov....
(:ru:Народ за демократию и справедливость) was established on the basis of the PDU, and Kasyanov was elected its chairman.
2008 presidential candidacy
In 2006 Kasyanov stated his desire to run for President of Russia in 2008Russian presidential election, 2008
The Russian Presidential election of 2008, held on March 2, 2008 resulted in the election of Dmitry Medvedev as the third President of Russia. Medvedev, whose candidacy was supported by incumbent president Vladimir Putin and five political parties , received 71% of the vote, and defeated...
. Kasyanov left (opposition group) The Other Russia
The Other Russia
The Other Russia , sometimes cited as Another Russia, is an umbrella coalition that gathered opponents of former President of Russia Vladimir Putin...
in July 2007 due to the group's failure to agree on a single presidential candidate. Kasyanov was nominated as a candidate in December 2007 and on 16 January 2008 he stated that he had finished collecting the 2 million signatures necessary to run as a candidate. http://www.gazeta.ru/politics/elections2008/2008/01/15_a_2558316.shtml Later in the month, however, the Central Election Commission rejected his candidacy on the grounds that 13.36% of the signatures were invalid. Kasyanov claimed that the decision to prevent his candidacy was taken by Putin himself, and he described the election as a farce, calling for a boycott.
The presentation of his book "Without Putin" the Ukrainian capital Kiev
Kiev
Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....
was cancelled on 18 December 2009. Kasyanov's press secretary claimed that the electricity went out in the Premier Palace Hotel minutes before the presentation was to start and that some 20 young men had blocked the entrance to the hotel to keep attendees from entering.
Fraud accusations and court case
Allegations that Kasyanov took a two percent commission in exchange for ignoring bribes and illegal business ventures whilst he was working at the Ministry of Finance between 1993 and 1999 led to him being dubbed as "Misha 2 percent" in the Russian media. In Russia's uncertain economic future, written for the United States Congress Joint Economic CommitteeUnited States Congress Joint Economic Committee
The Joint Economic Committee is one of four standing joint committees of the U.S. Congress. The committee was established as a part of the Employment Act of 1946, which deemed the committee responsible for reporting the current economic condition of the United States and for making suggestions...
, the allegations are described as credible, and a Spiegel
Der Spiegel
Der Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...
article from 2007 notes that Kasyanov insists that his only earnings as a public servant was his government salary and he was only involved in one private business venture since leaving the post of prime minister. The same article also claims that Kasyanov purchased the state-owned dacha
Dacha
Dacha is a Russian word for seasonal or year-round second homes often located in the exurbs of Soviet and post-Soviet cities. Cottages or shacks serving as family's main or only home are not considered dachas, although many purpose-built dachas are recently being converted for year-round residence...
of former Communist Party of the Soviet Union
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the only legal, ruling political party in the Soviet Union and one of the largest communist organizations in the world...
ideologue Mikhail Suslov
Mikhail Suslov
Mikhail Andreyevich Suslov was a Soviet statesman during the Cold War. He served as Second Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1965, and as unofficial Chief Ideologue of the Party until his death in 1982. Suslov was responsible for party democracy and the separation of power...
which was worth several million Euros.
On 11 July 2005, the Russian Office of Public Prosecutor started to investigate the privatization of two houses formerly owned by the government. According to allegations first made by the journalist and State Duma
State Duma
The State Duma , common abbreviation: Госду́ма ) in the Russian Federation is the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia , the upper house being the Federation Council of Russia. The Duma headquarters is located in central Moscow, a few steps from Manege Square. Its members are referred to...
member Aleksandr Hinshtein http://www.hinshtein.ru/cgi-bin/3publication.pl?nomer_novosti=65, two luxury government houses had been put up for sale in 2003 by a Kasyanov decree. According to the court verdict of 16 March 2007, he was to return a house and pay 108,135,000 rubles in damages to the government for using the property illegally (approx. USD 4,150,000 or €3,130,000). In 2007, Kasyanov was still planning to appeal. http://www.newsru.com/russia/16mar2007/kasjanovdacha.html
Timeline
- 1981-90: Engineer; Leading Economist; Senior Specialist; Head of Section, Department of Foreign Economic Relations of the State Planning Committee of the RSFSR.
- 1990: appointed Head of Section, Sub-department of Foreign Economic Relations of the State Planning Committee of the RSFSR.
- 1991: Deputy Head, Sub-department, then Head, Sub-department of Foreign Economic Relations of the Ministry of Economy of the Russian Federation.
- 1992-93: Head, Consolidation Department of the Ministry of Economy of the Russian Federation.
- 1993-95: Head, Department of Foreign Credits and External Debt of the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation and Member of the Board of the Ministry of Finance.
- 1995: appointed Deputy Minister of Finance.
- 1999: appointed First Deputy Minister of Finance.
- May 1999: appointed Minister of Finance of the Russian Federation.
- January 2000: appointed First Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation.
- May 2000: Prime Minister of the Russian Federation.
- February 2004: Sacked by President Putin along with the entire cabinet.
- March 2005: Mikhail Kasyanov launched his advisory firm MK Analytica. He started to vocally criticize Russian authorities for their anti-democratic drift and declared his intention to take part in the presidential elections in 2008 to change the general political course of the country.
- April 2006: Chairman of the People’s Democratic Union (PDU), a newly launched NGO.
- June 2007: Nominated by the PDU as a candidate for the presidential elections.
- July 2007: due to the group's failure to agree on a single presidential candidate Kasyanov leaves The Other RussiaThe Other RussiaThe Other Russia , sometimes cited as Another Russia, is an umbrella coalition that gathered opponents of former President of Russia Vladimir Putin...
. - September 2007: Chairman of the new political party "People for Democracy and Justice" established on the basis of PDU.
- December 2007: approved by a congress of supporters as a candidate for the presidential elections.
- January 2008: The Central Election Commission of Russia (ЦИК) barred his candidacy for the presidential elections, citing an excess of forgeries within his required two million signatures.
External links
- "The Empire of Freedom", op-edEditorialAn opinion piece is an article, published in a newspaper or magazine, that mainly reflects the author's opinion about the subject. Opinion pieces are featured in many periodicals.-Editorials:...
by Mikhail Kasyanov in KommersantKommersantKommersant is a commerce-oriented newspaper published in Russia. , the circulation was 131,000.- History :The newspaper was initially published in 1909, and it was closed down following the Bolshevik seizure of power and the introduction of censorship in 1917.In 1989, with the onset of press...
, 29 August 2006.