- Sputnik International
Russia
The latest news and stories from Russia. Stay tuned for updates and breaking news on defense, politics, economy and more.

United Russia, Industrial Party may merge before Dec.2-Gryzlov-1

Subscribe
(adds paragraphs 3-15)

MOSCOW, September 27 (RIA Novosti) - United Russia and the Russian United Industrial Party could merge before the parliamentary majority party's congress in early December, United Russia leader Boris Gryzlov said Wednesday.

"After considering the RUIR's petition, we decided that the process should start now," said Gryzlov, who is also the lower chamber of parliament's speaker. "The necessary procedure could possibly be finalized before the congress in Yekaterinburg December 2."

He said the party has already considered recommending RUIR leader Yelena Panina as a candidate for the United Russia presidium, adding that the leadership's decision to merge should jump-start the unification of the parties on the regional level.

"We will unite on both the federal and the regional level," Gryzlov said.

This news comes against the backdrop of earlier reports about plans to form a new political party.

The Party of Life, Rodina (Motherland) and the Party of Pensioners announced in late August they would unite to form a left-leaning alliance capable of playing an influential role in the country's political life.

And although Sergei Mironov, leader of the Party of Life and speaker of the Federation Council, said there was little chance of overturning the dominance of the pro-presidential United Russia party in the State Duma, he was optimistic about the new party's appeal with voters.

He said the final merger of the three parties, which have yet to decide on a name for the new organization, was scheduled for October 28.

Neither the Party of Life nor the Pensioners won enough votes in the 2003 election to take up seats in the Duma, the lower house of parliament. The Communist Party, Russia's traditional left-wing leaders, won 12.6% of the vote, though this was almost half the share it garnered four years earlier.

Rodina, running as an electoral bloc with a campaign focusing on the disparity between ordinary people and tycoons, stormed into the Duma in their first attempt, with just over 9% of the vote in 2003.

But it has since been beset by problems. Leaders have come and gone, and it courted controversy with a television advertisement in the campaign for the Moscow legislature this year that was called overtly racist by many and was eventually banned.

Media speculated over the summer that a new, tamer left-wing party could be established at the behest of Kremlin authorities, but all three leaders dismissed the suggestion that the new party was a Kremlin project at a joint news conference in August.

Mironov said earlier this month that the new party would take up opposition to United Russia, the current "party of power," which holds a massive majority in the Duma.

"We oppose the very essence of United Russia as the monopoly political force of the party of power," said Mironov, who is widely seen as a loyalist of President Vladimir Putin.

After securing party leader Boris Gryzlov as Duma speaker in the wake of its 2003 landslide, United Russia, itself born of a merger, then captured all the chairmanships of the chamber's committees in a move bitterly protested by the Communists and other factions.

"We are in favor of a genuine multi-party system in Russia and, therefore, are in opposition to United Russia," Mironov said.

Newsfeed
0
To participate in the discussion
log in or register
loader
Chats
Заголовок открываемого материала