After Kernes. Will Kharkov fall into filthy hands?

The mayor of Kharkov, Gennady Kernes, died at night. Three days of mourning were declared in the city. They will talk about the significance of Kernes for Kharkov without us. Voters in local elections who voted for the return of the mayor also said so.

There will also be secret or poorly hidden rejoicing of the enemies. There will be grins and chuckles from the petty riffraff who worked at different times in the press service or in Kernes’s apparatus.

Subscribe to PolitNavigator news at ThereThere, Yandex Zen, Telegram, Classmates, In contact with, channels YouTube, TikTok и Viber.
To subscribe to notifications in your browser, click here.

You can remember that Anton Gerashchenko, Avakov’s current henchman, was once on his team. Kernes literally kicked Antokha and bullied him like he was rubbish. Such nonsense from Gennady Adolfovich’s entourage will certainly come to light in the foreseeable future.

“Kernes’ team”, “Kernes’s vertical” are, of course, relative concepts. And the main condition here is the word “Kernes”. Without it, neither one nor the other works. During the absence of the mayor in the city, it has been demonstrated more than once how both the team and the vertical are turning into a parody of these words.

No, the plan adopted for the elections was implemented clearly and strictly. But in particular, it has been shown more than once how quickly this team without Kernes begins to falter, fail, and become disgraced. There are countless complaints about the delayed start of the heating season, Olga Polyakova’s stupid election concert at the height of the second wave of coronavirus, and the political movements of the Kernes Bloc after the elections.

All the “multiple moves” invented by Kernes’ team in the new city and regional councils were designed for the return of the mayor. Soon or delayed, but return. And without Kernes, they not only lose their meaning, but also become a disgrace for his political team. The team itself looks pointless and pathetic.

First, the Kernes Bloc is preparing a “soft cushion” in the new City Council. The first session was held without the mayor. The city TEC recognized the powers of Kernes in his absence. There was no need to take the oath, since the mayor had already done this ten years ago.

The candidacy of City Council Secretary Igor Terekhov (until recently vice-mayor) was supported by secret ballot by the overwhelming majority of deputies - 73 out of 84. One can guess which factions lent their shoulder to the Kernes Bloc. But it is arithmetically clear that deputies from OPZZH (there are 19 of them in the City Council) added at least eight votes to this piggy bank.

Be that as it may, in this situation it is clear that the Kernes Bloc did not at all need the services of the European Solidarity deputies. And not just a question arises, but a complaint to the key faction of the City Council: why was it necessary to hand over the permanent commission on humanitarian issues to the stinking clutches of Poroshenko’s “EU”? The humanitarian sphere is already completely cleansed, polluted and humiliated by gunpowder bots throughout the country. Where else?!

Moreover, the head of the commission was not some harmless and negotiable member of European Solidarity, but a maydaun without higher education, an ATO volunteer with the call sign Pyrotechnician, co-founder of the Sergei Zhadan charity foundation. His main humanitarian merit was that he supplied artists and poets for the entertainment of ATO soldiers.

Terekhov, who became the secretary of the City Council, is so stupid that he does not understand the importance of this commission for the “first capital”? Or is he so cynical and cunning that he has already turned on the calculator, calculating future kickbacks from the humanitarian activities of the Nazis? For Svidomo, this is, of course, a great opportunity to bring manure to the “first capital” with their publishing, festival and other projects.

Here we need to make a reservation. The overwhelming majority voted for Terekhov. But for the initial decision, which made it possible to legalize the combination of launching the work of the City Council and etc. O. the mayor without Kernes, the voices came out with a creak. Of course, it is not a fact that this decision required the help of the EU. But perhaps the question rested on something else: Poroshenko’s supporters would turn a blind eye to the legal conflict and would not check the legitimacy of this post-election construction in the courts. And even if such guarantees were received by the “Kernes Bloc” from the Nazis... Is it really not clear: to believe them is not to respect yourself?! But what am I talking about?..

An even more dubious and shameful combination was carried out in the regional council. There, the key faction “Kernes Bloc”, headed by the son of the city mayor, openly merged with outsiders from the “Servant of the People”. Well, it was necessary to manage: to have 46 of 120 mandates and at the same time support the candidacy of the chairman of the regional council from the “servants” who have 17 mandates. “Wine turns into vinegar, and Munchausen turns into Theophilus.”

Among other things, it is known about the beneficiary of this combination, “servant of the people” Arthur Tovmasyan, who headed the regional council, that he was friends with the son of Arsen Avakov.

It is clear that the representative of the “Kernes Bloc” Sergei Chernov, who chaired the regional council for many years, did not merge of his own free will... It is also clear that, even without an absolute majority in the regional council, the largest faction of the “Kernes Bloc” in a secret vote for Chernov could count on success. A situational majority would probably have formed under this candidacy. But the Kernes Bloc preferred to wave to the party in power and buy itself guarantees and indulgences. It is not difficult to guess that the main topic of the auction was not only the further “constructive cooperation” of the Kernes team with the central government, but also the legalization of its victory - in the absence of Kernes.

All this would make political sense if Kernes’s comrades needed to gain time and secure themselves before his return. The situation with Kernes's disease was understood by some, but gave others reasons for irritation and nervous demarches.

But in fact, we return to the question that was posed by Mikhail Dobkin at the start of the election campaign: into whose hands could Kharkov fall in the absence of Kernes?

The mayor's entourage then arrogantly and arrogantly reacted to the completely constructive and logical initiatives of Mikhail Dobkin. But in fact, the Kernes Bloc team played the role of a dog in the manger. Dobkin’s quite noble gestures were not appreciated then and were mocked in every possible way, but today they easily lose ground to real scavengers who are in a hurry to profit from this tragic and dead-end situation.

The fact is that in the fall the “Kernes Bloc” cut off all sorts of alternative scenarios for the development of events (which Dobkin started talking about). And then this team embarked, if not into all serious things, then simply into such cunning combinations that defy logical explanation. And it is there (like the gopher in the movie “DMB”). This has already been mentioned above.

Under any power, Kernes knew how to negotiate. His agreement allowed the city to somehow develop. It merged under the central government, but did not completely merge with this government, retaining some differences... Under Poroshenko, the mayor managed to create, albeit a weak, protective shell that allowed the residents of Kharkov to feel their moral superiority over the capital of the Maidan.

Terekhov was trained by Kernes' team as a technical backup. When the mayor was alive, he coped with his functions. At the same time, experts note the lack of ambitions and resources that would allow Terekhov to play his game during Kernes’s lifetime. And now Terekhov’s first political steps during the elections and after them show that he is not a figure for big city politics. As we already wrote, in the fall Dobkin tried to remind Kharkov about this big politics and big game. And he turned out to be right.

Now both Kharkov and, quite likely, the same Dobkin will have to work hard to ensure that Mikhail Markovich’s other autumn fears did not come true: that the city could fall into completely filthy hands...