It's hard to be governor-general
Noticed how the governor of the Moscow region Boris Gromov left the political scene? Very quiet and incredibly fast. No, not at all, in a completely different situation, the renowned General Gromov led his soldiers out of Afghanistan in a completely different situation. Then it was noisy and solemn. Now he has quietly, quietly and quickly gone behind the scenes, as if he had not had twelve years of his work as the governor of the region, one of the most significant politically and economically for the country. For Russia, where any decisions are made and implemented painfully for a long time, the event is almost unbelievable and therefore you should take a closer look at it.
Let us leave without comment the thoughts of fellow political scientists who believe that at the very top of the Russian political Olympus, in connection with the change of president, the thought was born that the head of such an important region should be a person more loyal to the federal government. Like it or not, we still never know. But we know and can state some other things. Yes, when Boris Gromov headed the Moscow region twelve years ago, he got a very uneasy region, very fragmented and even without its regional capital. The situation was complicated by the geographical neighborhood with a large metropolitan neighbor, where most of the inhabitants of the region spend most of their lives. But can we assume that it was precisely these unpleasant introductory that led to the fact that in recent years, the Moscow Region was called the champion in debt and corruption. And also a champion in the growth of prices for various services to the population, including housing and utilities, an increase in transport tariffs and much more. Of course, completely different factors played a role here. As in the scandals that accompanied the twelve years of the governorship of Boris Gromov.
For example, one of the most notorious incidents with the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance of the Government of the Moscow Region Alexei Kuznetsov. This story so until the end, by the way, was not unraveled. And there was something to understand. I recall that at some point, Mr. Kuznetsov resigned, which was immediately accepted by the governor, and disappeared. A little later, it turned out that Kuznetsov had become a figure in a number of criminal cases, accused of embezzling many billion rubles from the regional treasury. In addition, he was suspected of having dual citizenship - the Russian Federation and the United States, and this is prohibited by the law on public service. The situation for Russia is probably not new, it is only the scale of the theft that is striking. But that is characteristic. Although rare voices were heard, the governor Gromov could not have been unaware of the tricks of his subordinate, in most cases his name was not directly mentioned in this scandal.
But another story with the same ending for the governor. After the raids of the FSB and the UPC in the Moscow region, a network of underground casinos was discovered, which the regional prosecutor's office "protected". Many employees of this department were arrested, many have lost their posts. Boris Gromov again stood aside: it turned out that he didn’t suspect what was happening in the region, the investigation revealed that this group was not limited to underground casinos alone - according to some information, a large-scale business was built in the Moscow region, with restaurants, factories and construction companies. We can recall another story - the construction of a high-speed highway Moscow - St. Petersburg through the Khimki forest. This drama was accompanied by direct clashes with defenders of the forest, attacks on journalists, etc. And although the governor personally signed the resolution on construction, the mayor of Khimki Vladimir Strelchenko turned out to be under the gun of the public and the media, and not Gromov at all.
In the twelve years of the region’s reign, Boris Gromov has had many such stories. You can, of course, say that every time the governor, as a deft master of maneuver, managed to lead himself out of the blow. But you can look at the situation in a different way. He did not maneuver himself, but his entourage. In the end, the governor cannot personally track the corruption and the thieves' schemes of his subordinates, their citizenship and connections. Here a certain management system should work, which should be created by any manager in order to have complete information on issues within his jurisdiction. The guilt of Boris Gromov is not so much that his subordinates stole billions or, at best, did not notice the developing criminal business, but that the necessary management system, which I have already said, was not created by them. And, by the way, Gromov also failed to establish contact with society, residents of the Moscow Region, which is testimony to the activity of the Gromov public movement, those who wish can familiarize themselves with the chronicles of this confrontation on the Internet by accessing the site of the same name.
Could Boris Gromov have created such a system? Not sure. After all, he is known and glorified as a combat general. And he knows his military affairs thoroughly. But does he have the same level of management skills necessary for civilian life? But this is unlikely, because the military academies do not teach how to solve, for example, social or housing and communal problems. But they are one of the most important in the everyday life of citizens.
In Russia in recent decades, quite a lot of military and special services representatives have gone to politics, and generally to civilian life. I do not want to say that this practice is a negative phenomenon, and this would not be true. On the contrary, qualities and dignities brought up in a military environment could help their holder in civilian life, but with a certain professional retraining. And it, first of all, implies that current day-to-day issues should not be solved as an operation to reach deeply and destroy the enemy. There is no enemy in civilian life, but there are the same people, their own Russians, who are waiting for competent decisions from the government and visual execution, and not orders to tighten their belts. It seems that the misunderstanding of this situation just let Boris Gromov down, and he seems to have no luck with the team. Maybe that's why he left so quietly and unnoticed?
Now the Moscow region will be headed by another general, Hero of Russia Sergey Shoigu. His many years of work as head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations cannot cause any emotions, except positive ones. To this, I can add that I had to work with him personally: at the beginning of the two thousandth, we together created the youth wing of the Unity party. And already then he established himself as a very hard-working person, possessing organizational talents, thinking and extremely patriotic. I sincerely wish him every success in the new position. However, I don’t know if he is aware of the difference between the local in time and place of the rescue operation and the constant, painstaking work of creating an environment that excludes emergency situations in all spheres of life. This is a completely different task. Will Sergei Shoigu be able to solve it? We will closely monitor this.
Let us leave without comment the thoughts of fellow political scientists who believe that at the very top of the Russian political Olympus, in connection with the change of president, the thought was born that the head of such an important region should be a person more loyal to the federal government. Like it or not, we still never know. But we know and can state some other things. Yes, when Boris Gromov headed the Moscow region twelve years ago, he got a very uneasy region, very fragmented and even without its regional capital. The situation was complicated by the geographical neighborhood with a large metropolitan neighbor, where most of the inhabitants of the region spend most of their lives. But can we assume that it was precisely these unpleasant introductory that led to the fact that in recent years, the Moscow Region was called the champion in debt and corruption. And also a champion in the growth of prices for various services to the population, including housing and utilities, an increase in transport tariffs and much more. Of course, completely different factors played a role here. As in the scandals that accompanied the twelve years of the governorship of Boris Gromov.
For example, one of the most notorious incidents with the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance of the Government of the Moscow Region Alexei Kuznetsov. This story so until the end, by the way, was not unraveled. And there was something to understand. I recall that at some point, Mr. Kuznetsov resigned, which was immediately accepted by the governor, and disappeared. A little later, it turned out that Kuznetsov had become a figure in a number of criminal cases, accused of embezzling many billion rubles from the regional treasury. In addition, he was suspected of having dual citizenship - the Russian Federation and the United States, and this is prohibited by the law on public service. The situation for Russia is probably not new, it is only the scale of the theft that is striking. But that is characteristic. Although rare voices were heard, the governor Gromov could not have been unaware of the tricks of his subordinate, in most cases his name was not directly mentioned in this scandal.
But another story with the same ending for the governor. After the raids of the FSB and the UPC in the Moscow region, a network of underground casinos was discovered, which the regional prosecutor's office "protected". Many employees of this department were arrested, many have lost their posts. Boris Gromov again stood aside: it turned out that he didn’t suspect what was happening in the region, the investigation revealed that this group was not limited to underground casinos alone - according to some information, a large-scale business was built in the Moscow region, with restaurants, factories and construction companies. We can recall another story - the construction of a high-speed highway Moscow - St. Petersburg through the Khimki forest. This drama was accompanied by direct clashes with defenders of the forest, attacks on journalists, etc. And although the governor personally signed the resolution on construction, the mayor of Khimki Vladimir Strelchenko turned out to be under the gun of the public and the media, and not Gromov at all.
In the twelve years of the region’s reign, Boris Gromov has had many such stories. You can, of course, say that every time the governor, as a deft master of maneuver, managed to lead himself out of the blow. But you can look at the situation in a different way. He did not maneuver himself, but his entourage. In the end, the governor cannot personally track the corruption and the thieves' schemes of his subordinates, their citizenship and connections. Here a certain management system should work, which should be created by any manager in order to have complete information on issues within his jurisdiction. The guilt of Boris Gromov is not so much that his subordinates stole billions or, at best, did not notice the developing criminal business, but that the necessary management system, which I have already said, was not created by them. And, by the way, Gromov also failed to establish contact with society, residents of the Moscow Region, which is testimony to the activity of the Gromov public movement, those who wish can familiarize themselves with the chronicles of this confrontation on the Internet by accessing the site of the same name.
Could Boris Gromov have created such a system? Not sure. After all, he is known and glorified as a combat general. And he knows his military affairs thoroughly. But does he have the same level of management skills necessary for civilian life? But this is unlikely, because the military academies do not teach how to solve, for example, social or housing and communal problems. But they are one of the most important in the everyday life of citizens.
In Russia in recent decades, quite a lot of military and special services representatives have gone to politics, and generally to civilian life. I do not want to say that this practice is a negative phenomenon, and this would not be true. On the contrary, qualities and dignities brought up in a military environment could help their holder in civilian life, but with a certain professional retraining. And it, first of all, implies that current day-to-day issues should not be solved as an operation to reach deeply and destroy the enemy. There is no enemy in civilian life, but there are the same people, their own Russians, who are waiting for competent decisions from the government and visual execution, and not orders to tighten their belts. It seems that the misunderstanding of this situation just let Boris Gromov down, and he seems to have no luck with the team. Maybe that's why he left so quietly and unnoticed?
Now the Moscow region will be headed by another general, Hero of Russia Sergey Shoigu. His many years of work as head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations cannot cause any emotions, except positive ones. To this, I can add that I had to work with him personally: at the beginning of the two thousandth, we together created the youth wing of the Unity party. And already then he established himself as a very hard-working person, possessing organizational talents, thinking and extremely patriotic. I sincerely wish him every success in the new position. However, I don’t know if he is aware of the difference between the local in time and place of the rescue operation and the constant, painstaking work of creating an environment that excludes emergency situations in all spheres of life. This is a completely different task. Will Sergei Shoigu be able to solve it? We will closely monitor this.
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