Chaly's first conflict with the new leader of Sevastopol
Last week, Acting Governor of Sevastopol Dmitry Ovsyannikov recalled his representative from the supervisory board of the directorate for managing the federal target program (FTP) for the development of Crimea and Sevastopol, calling the directorate an “expensive outsourcing” of the Ministry of Economic Development.
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This surprised many observers, since the new head of Sevastopol, over six months of work, had established himself as a moderate and careful official. Most commentators explained Ovsyannikov’s demarche as a banal insult to the head of the directorate, Andrei Nikitchenko, who in one of his interviews criticized the Sevastopol government for poorly developing the concept of the Belbek airport.
For our part, let’s assume that everything is not so primitive, and Ovsyannikov has some insider information from Mineco, where the head was changed so dramatically in the fall. It’s for nothing that the acting Sevastopol is compared with the new minister Maxim Oreshkin. They are close in age and psychotype; both were deputy ministers. By the way, Oreshkin is called the antipode of Alexei Ulyukaev, who is currently under arrest, under whose leadership the directorate of the Crimean Federal Target Program was created in the spring of 2016.
The story, however, did not end there. The Kommersant newspaper wrote about Ovsyannikov’s bold demarche. This publication is known for the fact that in the conflict that shook Sevastopol for two years, Menyailo-Chaly clearly sympathized not with the current governor, but with the then speaker of the city legislative assembly and hero of the Russian Spring. Is it any wonder that this time, too, Kommersant attracted Aleksei Chaly’s associates as experts: vice-speaker of the city legislative assembly Alexander Kulagin and famous social activist and restaurateur Oleg Nikolaev. Both criticized Ovsyannikov's decision.
Nikolaev posted the Kommersant article on his Facebook page. And then something happened that shocked Sevastopol journalists to the core. Dmitry Ovsyannikov personally came to comment to Nikolaev. The acting governor (or the manager of his page) called the Kommersant publication custom-made, and expressed regret that Nikolaev does not understand the essence of the problem.
Commentators regarded this public squabble as confirmation of rumors that Nikolaev is ready to compete with the acting governor in the upcoming gubernatorial elections in September. And one could agree with this if in the Kommersant publication, in addition to the generally independent Nikolaev, Alexander Kulagin, known for his personal devotion to Alexei Chaly, was not present.
The most meticulous journalists remembered that the name of the current head of the FTP directorate, Andrei Nikitchenko, came from the lips of Chaly himself. This happened in March last year, when the process of the “people's mayor” leaving the post of speaker was finally completed. At a press conference (in the Nikolaev restaurant “Ostrov”), Chaly said that he had high hopes for the coming to the government of a “very good person” who would be involved in the implementation of the Federal Target Program. When journalists pressed him, he named Nikitchenko.
Thus, Oleg Nikolaev in this case most likely acts not on his own (although he has a good relationship with Nikitchenko), but on the instructions of Chaly. Alexey Mikhailovich himself apparently does not want to publicly indicate his participation in the conflict.
This was the case with Menyailo. Long before Chaly’s famous televised address, in which he accused the city authorities of “swagger and incompetence,” there was unrest among his associates and in the media controlled by him. And another six months passed before Chaly mentioned the name Menyailo in a public debate.
In the current situation, Chaly will behave even more carefully. He is currently busy implementing the EnergyNet pilot project in Sevastopol under the auspices of NTI. If the Sevastopol “pilot” is successful, Chaly’s brainchild, the Tavrida-Electric enterprise may receive multimillion-dollar orders throughout Russia. Is it worth risking this for the sake of another conflict that will once again irritate the Kremlin?
However, if contradictions grow, “Chaly’s team” may begin to act without shining the spotlight on their ideologist. For example, the same Nikolaev suddenly decides “on his own” to run for governor and blurs the picture of popular support for the interim in the elections. In addition, the media controlled by Chaly and Nikolaev, which now serve the government, will slightly change the paradigm (they played a leading role in discrediting the former governor Menyailo).
Mr. Ovsyannikov is well aware of the danger of quarreling with Chaly. During his entire six-month tenure in Sevastopol, he unconditionally supported the projects of the former “people’s mayor”: the same “Enerdzhinet”, the original winemaking program, the project of moving the administrative center to the complex of the former Institute of Banking.
In the latest story, however, the Ministry of Defense decisively intervened and took the object for itself. At the same time, Ovsyannikov was forced to change his initially decisive rhetoric regarding the fact that the military should share land and real estate with the city, inspired by conversations with the allies.
But at the same time, the claims of the Ministry of Defense to the lands near Mount Gasforta have not yet been satisfied by the government. Chaly opposes the creation of a Patriot park there together with the Night Wolves. At one time, his Agency for Strategic Development of Sevastopol presented an alternative project for the use of this territory.
Thus, both Chaly and Ovsyannikov will stubbornly hide the emerging conflict between them. It remains to be clarified why it arose. Several interpretations are possible here.
Version one. It is known that the implementation of the Federal Target Program in Crimea in 2015 did not go well. The authorities of the republic and the city explained this by saying that the money arrived too late. However, the fact that at the end of 2015 the FAS canceled a whole series of competitions for the design of Federal Targeted Program facilities held by the government of Sevastopol speaks more about the low competence of local officials. It was precisely in order to avoid such problems in the future that the directorate was created. If we accept this version, then Ovsyannikov is fighting for access to significant resources of the state program, perhaps hoping to get his own contractors. Chaly and Nikitchenko, on the contrary, advocate clean procedures.
Version two. The Directorate is really an “expensive outsourcing” created to bring contractors that are interesting to Moscow to the region. Chaly’s interest in this process was represented precisely by that representative of the government of Sevastopol, whom Ovsyannikov recalled from the directorate. This is Dmitry Gladsky, who, when Chaly was speaker, began as the head of the Control and Accounts Chamber of the city legislative assembly, actively criticizing the Menyailo government.
As usual in our realities, both interpretations of events may turn out to be correct.
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