The Kremlin has commented on the petition to resign Medvedev. The angry communists demand the resignation of Putin and Medvedev What will the resignation of Medvedev lead to?

A scandal erupted in Yamal over a tender for the disposal of portraits of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev.

The point is this. Last month, the administration of the Nadym region announced a tender for waste disposal. According to the documentation, it was about office furniture, computer equipment, as well as two portraits of Medvedev, who was listed in the materials as the President of the Russian Federation. The starting price was 256 thousand rubles. Responsible for the placement of the electronic auction was Aleksey Koksharov, deputy head of the administration of the Nadym region.

Nevertheless, the situation attracted the attention of local media, causing widespread resonance.

"Aleksey Koksharov does not work in the administration of the municipal formation of the Nadym region," an interlocutor of RIA Novosti in the regional administration said, stressing that he did not know the details of the official's departure.

Of course, it cannot be argued that the resignation of the apparatchik is connected with these unfortunate portraits. However, it can be assumed that someone at the top was afraid that Medvedev might become president again and decided to play it safe. The talks about the return of the prime minister to the Kremlin have been going on for a long time. They will chop portraits into cabbage, and suddenly it turns out that these were the faces of the new / old president of the Russian Federation? And for this they will definitely not pat on the head.

Some will say that Medvedev's re-election as head of state is too fantastic a scenario. But this is only at first glance.

The issue of the transit of power in 2024 is open. Let us remind you that the last time, before the 2008 elections, the Kremlin kept the name of its successor a secret until recently. Then it was just the current head of government. Maybe the Kremlin will decide that they are not looking for good from the good, and will repeat the "castling" that has already worked once?

That's political scientist Valery Solovey quite admits this possibility. As he writes in his Telegram channel, preparations for the transit of power are in full swing in the Kremlin, special groups are working on this, which have already outlined 40 different options. At the same time, in his opinion, those at the top are inclined to believe that the creation of a State Council headed by Putin would be the optimal solution, and Dmitry Medvedev would become president.

Let us recall that Medvedev won the elections in 2008 easily, with a result of 70.28%. However, then certain hopes were pinned on him - both supporters and opponents of the existing regime. And in the West he was received very favorably. What now?

It is unlikely that the West will support Medvedev's candidacy - for them, any successors to Putin who continue his course are unacceptable. But the main thing is that the current prime minister is unlikely to be supported by the population of Russia, for whom in recent years the name of Medvedev has become synonymous with everything bad in power. It is with him that cannibalistic reforms are associated, especially pension reforms, and other extremely unpopular actions of the liberal economic bloc of the government, which is constantly becoming the object of criticism of all segments of the population, regardless of political beliefs.

The controversial statements of officials, including Medvedev himself (“there is no money, but you are holding on”), add fuel to the fire. In recent months, rumors have regularly appeared about the imminent resignation of the Cabinet and its head, who can be made "scapegoats" for all the unsuccessful steps of the government.

Is it possible to push a person into the presidency with such a background? In fact, history shows that it is possible, it is enough to recall the same Boris Yeltsin in 1996. According to Valery Solovyov, the Kremlin is confident that Medvedev will be elected to the presidency, and is ready to do this at the cost of unprecedented, even by Russian standards, falsifications and administrative pressure.

“At the regional elections-2019 and subsequent ones, the techniques of such“ election ”are being tested,” he writes.

How real is all this?

To begin with, the resignation of Koksharov has nothing to do with Dmitry Medvedev's motivation to become president of Russia after Putin's departure, I am sure director of the EAEU Institute Vladimir Lepekhin.

Alexey Koksharov no further than in February of this year. was dismissed from the post of Deputy Prime Minister of the Perm Region - and here it is again. Today he is a minor official at the district level, but it seems that in this post, too, he got sick of someone. So the banal situation with the alleged tender for the disposal of dilapidated furniture (and at the same time outdated portraits of Medvedev) was intentionally inflated by the media in order to finally bury the functionary.

"SP": - The question is not this: can the Kremlin go for a new nomination of Medvedev as a successor? Do we have any other suitable candidates?

In fact, the Kremlin has not 40, but only 3 options for the transit of power for 2024: the transit of Putin to Putin, the change of Putin to Medvedev, and the transfer of power to someone from Putin's team. The authorities believe that they have no problems with the implementation of any of these scenarios - even with the re-election of a person with a huge negative rating, such as Dmitry Anatolyevich, as president of the country. After all, the authorities will still count the votes, and any alternative will be blocked.

"SP": - Is Medvedev too compromised? It seems that recently he has been specially prepared for the "drain" with all his ambiguous statements, pension reform, etc. Is this accidental?

The real rating of a candidate is irrelevant in a situation where political democracy in Russia is almost completely curtailed in that part of it that concerns personnel issues. As Putin says, it will be so. He will say - to elect a dead cat president - she will be "elected". And the current so-called "compromise" of Medvedev is an objective assessment of his activities. No one, like Dmitry Anatolyevich himself, discredits the country's prime minister today.

"SP": - They say that the Kremlin is inclined to believe that the optimal solution would be the creation of the State Council headed by Putin. That is, Putin, in fact, will not go anywhere, but will take a new position?

As for Putin, he, naturally, will not go anywhere - regardless of what the Kremlin thinks. And it doesn't matter what his position will be called: "leader of the nation" - as in Kazakhstan, "Prime Minister 2.0" or the head of the RF Security Council (which would be ideal).

It should be understood that the power in Russia today is not a politician named Putin, but a specific clan whose interests are represented by Vladimir Vladimirovich. And this clan will hold on to the current president to the last. So far, no one can oppose anything or anyone to this clan: the protective logic of the actions of the current quasi-elites burns out any attempts at change.

As for the analogues of the political system that has developed in the Russian Federation, it is not in world history. We need to understand that today in the Russian Federation we have an unprecedented situation, which will eventually lead to monstrous results. And in this sense, it is not a far-fetched problem of the transit of power that should be discussed (this transit ended in 2012, when Putin received the go-ahead from the West to be re-elected as head of state, and capitalism of a colonial and peripheral type developed in the country). It is necessary to discuss the question of how to preserve the state after its inevitable impending collapse due to the impasse into which the current ruling class has brought Russia.

2024 is still far away, and Putin himself is more of a tactician than a strategist, therefore, perhaps, he is not being very cunning, answering that he has not yet thought about what will happen in five years, '' notes leader of the St. Petersburg branch of the unregistered party "Other Russia" Andrei Dmitriev.

I think he'll try to stay if some black swan doesn't fly by. He has been "married" to power for 18 years and why would he leave it? He is not an impulsive Yeltsin, and his health is much better. But there may be various options in order to observe constitutional decency. The State Council headed by Putin and President Medvedev looks like a working scheme here.

As has been noted more than once, the main thing for VVP is that the ally does not turn out to be a traitor and be personally loyal to him. According to these criteria, Medvedev was elected for the first time, and now he is number 1 in the queue.

The fact that he is compromised is even good. Indeed, for the electorate, the image of the national leader must be radiant. Therefore, the presidential campaign can be based on the fact that Putin is not going anywhere, and they will show him, and somewhere nearby and slightly behind - smiling Medvedev.

In the presence of agreed parsley as competitors and the possibilities of the administrative resource, election to him is still guaranteed. Look at the last elections of the governor of St. Petersburg - Beglov was elected not by washing, but by rolling, with the lowest turnout in 30 years and in the absence of supporters, with the exception of those who simply always vote for power. And the favorite slogan of the Navalnists "for anyone except ..." will not work here, because after all, they will not elect a deputy, but a president, for whom they will not vote at all.

"SP": - Will the people calmly accept it?

But the potential for street protests, especially since the new generation of zero years of birth is already entering adulthood and, in its active part, is quite critical of the authorities, is very great. And the disturbances of the deep people, like Shies, are also indicative. Therefore, the Kremlin can expect all sorts of "surprises".

Experienced sharpers are sitting at the card table of high Russian politics and it is unrealistic to try to win against them at poker. 102 years ago, a bald man in a cap was found who turned the card table over and laid out a program for building a new world on it. And what will happen in 2024 - "we'll see."

The Kremlin has not yet familiarized itself with the petition for the resignation of Dmitry Medvedev from the post of prime minister, said the presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov. Over the past day, two petitions about the resignation of the prime minister appeared on Change.org

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev (Photo: Donat Sorokin / TASS)

The Kremlin has not yet familiarized itself with the petition for the resignation of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, which appeared on the Change.org website. This was announced on Thursday by the press secretary of the President of Russia Dmitry Peskov, answering the relevant question of the journalists, the correspondent of RBC reports.

“No, we do not know about it yet, I don’t think it requires any reaction,” Peskov said.

On August 4, Change.org posted a petition demanding the resignation of Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. The authors of the petition note that "the Cabinet should be headed by a competent, educated person who cares for the country." "The fish rots from the head, maybe that's why the" efficiency "of the ministries' work ?!" - said in the petition. At the moment, it has been signed by over 5 thousand people.

On August 3, a petition appeared on Change.org urging Medvedev to apologize to teachers and step down. “According to his insulting logic, it turns out that if a teacher has a vocation, then he can work for free. An excellent excuse for your own mediocre work, ”writes the author of the petition and calls on the Russian President to dismiss Medvedev. “I also think that Medvedev, with his statements about the lack of vocation, offended all teachers in Russia, so I must apologize to them,” the petition says. This petition at the time of writing was signed by about 1.5 thousand people.

Last Tuesday, Medvedev, during a conversation with the participants of the "Territory of Meanings" forum, said that teachers who are dissatisfied with their salaries. The statement followed after one of the forum participants - a teacher - asked why teachers receive 10-15 thousand rubles each, and law enforcement officers - more than 50 thousand rubles.

“I am often asked about this. Both for teachers and teachers - this is a vocation. And if you want to make money, there are tons of great places where you can do it faster and better. The same business. But you didn’t go into business, as I understand it, ”Medvedev told the teacher who asked the question.

Peskov also answered the question of journalists whether there are difficulties with raising the salaries of teachers, asked in the context of Medvedev's statements. “The situation in this case cannot be generalized, the situation is different from region to region. We know that in some regions it is really not possible to comply with the criteria for teachers, but the work is underway, "said Peskov (quoted by TASS). He stressed that the criteria established by the May decrees, “as of today, no one has revised or changed”. At the same time, the presidential press secretary noted that the situation in different regions can change in different directions from year to year. The President is monitoring this topic, he assured.

The day before, Peskov commented on the publication of the Financial Times newspaper, in which, after the elections to the State Duma. This is a column by Timothy Ash that appeared in the August 1 edition. In it, the author, in particular, predicts Medvedev's possible resignation from the post of prime minister. “Exercises on the forthcoming resignation of the government are not new. We know that with enviable consistency everyone is guessing on the coffee grounds, "Peskov said, adding that" this is such constant speculation that it is no longer perceived as noteworthy information. "

A circle of the same persons literally hovered around the authorities

According to a recent Levada Center poll, most Russians believe the Russian government is incapable of dealing with socioeconomic problems and should therefore be dismissed. The same conclusion is confirmed by many other polls that were conducted in the fall and on New Year's Eve. For the sake of fairness, it must be said that even before our fellow citizens did not particularly highly appreciate the work of the Cabinet of Ministers, while being loyal to its individual members and personally to the Prime Minister. However, when the government did not change in the spring of 2018 (and this was expected, linking the renewal of the cabinet with the promised "big break") and instead of building a bright future took up unpopular reforms, its ratings plummeted.

Yes, of course, starting from the summer and autumn of last year, the population, in principle, began to trust the authorities less, but the Cabinet of Ministers is still perceived as the main evil. When you talk to ordinary people, you often hear: "The government is to blame for everything, it does not know how to work, they must be driven out" and other similar maxims. The respondents are sincerely surprised why the prime minister and his team are still being held.

Knowledgeable people, of course, understand that such a focus, which is based on the separation of the president and the government, "the tsar and the boyars", is the result of many years of work by the propaganda machine, which for everything that is done in the economy and social sphere, assigns and assigns responsibility precisely to the cabinet of ministers, emphasizing its independence in decision-making. It is not the president who sets the economic course, says the TV, but the prime minister and members of the government (which is why people were so waiting for the head of state's reaction to the reforms last summer). It is the cabinet that decides how to deal with fuel prices. It is the ministers who are to blame for all the blunders, and it is on their conscience - low salaries, rising prices and other social problems.

From the point of view of political technologies, such a translation of the arrows was - until recently - not devoid of meaning. The top leadership of the country and the ruling elite were removed from the blow. At the same time, for the time being, the rating of the Prime Minister was not allowed to fall (allowing abstract criticism of “officials”, “liberals”, “government”) - after all, if you drop it too much, the question will arise: where is the president looking? It was important that the falling prime minister did not pull along with him other political figures on whom political stability was based.

In a relatively tolerable economic environment, it worked. However, the situation has now changed. The government failed sociologically, followed by all other ratings. During the polls, respondents criticize not only ministers, but also the president's attitude to economic and social policy (although they continue to give him his due in international affairs). People are waiting for effective decisions, Ukraine and Trump are clearly not enough for them - they need a change in the level, quality of life, and overcoming social gaps. "Bad boyars" cannot rule forever - someone must eventually restore order. It is time for the “owner of the Russian land” to return to this very land and prioritize internal rather than external problems - this is also evidenced by opinion polls, in which the population associates the greatness of Russia with the well-being of its inhabitants.

So what, the resignation of the government and the formation of a new, creative and disruptive cabinet are coming? No, no matter how much ordinary Russians want it, I believe this will not happen in the near future. And there are several reasons for this.

First. "There is nobody to take." The famous phrase of Alexander I is relevant again. The management team that has developed over 20 years is devoid of bright figures who could effectively replace the current leadership of the executive branch. It was in the crisis year of 1998 that Yeltsin had Yevgeny Primakov close at hand, literally pulling the economy out of the hole. Now such figures are gone: for 20 years in a row cadres of a completely different nature have been promoted to the top, and we see the results of their activities. Even at that time, Primakov and others like him already looked like an anomaly in the system: it was not for nothing that Yeltsin dismissed his government six months after his appointment.

People who rose up in the 1990s came to replace the managers of the old, strong and, by the way, truly patriotic formation. Then their children grew up. With an outward veneer, they, as a rule, have a very specific idea of \u200b\u200bthe development of Russia. And, alas, they are rarely patriots, many do not want to live in Russia at all.

Now a circle of the same persons literally hovers around the authorities - shuffle them or not, it turns out, as in the famous quartet: the same "violins", only in profile. Almost all of them have been in high positions for years and even decades, have managed to visit various statuses - and all with the same result. Trying to exclude bright, strong, independent people from politics, the authorities eventually faced a personnel vacuum. As it was figuratively said in one good Soviet film: "So when the stutterer-king, the subjects began to stutter."

Now, in order to achieve fundamental changes in the economy, in the development of the country, the state needs to literally rotate its personnel policy by 180 degrees, change the very system of forming elites - as Peter the Great, Alexandra I, II and III, Soviet leaders once did.

The second and main reason: it is not the government that actually determines the economic policy of the country. No matter what the TV says, real decisions are made by a different circle of people. There is a ruling elite, and the government is an instrument that implements its will. Of course, the ministers are completely independent in details, but the fundamentals of the course are not approved at all in the offices of the White House. If you just change people without changing course, then the ratings of the new Cabinet will fall exactly the same as that of the current one, but there will be no one to blame for the responsibility. This is where the dog is buried: the change in the foundations of economic policy hits the interests of many large figures - and therefore they do not go for it, respectively, delaying the reform of the cabinet as much as possible.

So, it is obvious that a change of government now would only worsen the political situation, without giving any special salvation to the system. As an ultima ratio, it can take place in case of a further strong drop in the government's ratings, when it will be necessary to blow off steam. This moment, however, has not yet arrived.

However, will this decision be so effective if it is eventually accepted? I think no. For a short time, the people will be filled with hopes, but when they see "old new faces" or unpleasant majors from the children of the elite and business top management, they will again fall into frustration. What is needed is not just a change of the facade - the policy of the state itself must change, and this policy must be pursued by a new, high-quality management team.

Where could it be taken from? I think, first of all, from the localities, from the regions. The country has smart governors, regional managers, and production workers. There are also good economists and industry specialists. And at the federal level, in ministries, departments, in the State Duma, there are a lot of smart people, they are simply not given a go, they are not fully in demand in the current conditions.

The team needs to be assembled literally bit by bit, while personnel updates at all levels should take place. It is not someone's children, friends, classmates and adherents who should lead the industries, but people who have knowledge, experience and the necessary human qualities: honesty, integrity, purposefulness.

Will such a team be created in the near future? Alas, I think not. I am not a pessimist - I am sure that the country will eventually steer (it always did), but it takes a lot of work and time. And this will definitely not happen as long as our bosses are selected according to the principle of personal acquaintance and personal merit, and the top elite does not change, despite the poor quality of their work. For the time being, people who make one mistake after another continue to be relocated, promoted and assigned to areas strategically important for the country.

There have been periods in Russian history when the authorities knew how to understand the complexity of the situation and formed strong, professional governments. Suffice it to recall, for example, Stolypin, who helped the country emerge from the chaos of the first revolution. True, as soon as everything calmed down, the tsar immediately began to push aside the strong prime minister, and after his death he completely curtailed the reforms. How it ended - we all remember.

The current personnel policy resembles the principles of recruiting at the beginning of the last century, when Stolypin was a black sheep against the background of a gray mass of loyal middle peasants, "technocrats" and all kinds of relatives and protégés. Needless to say, this is a very dangerous path for the state in times of crisis? ..

The Communist Party of the Russian Federation officially demanded the resignation of President Putin and Prime Minister Medvedev and Prime Minister Medvedev for the resignation of the red governor Levchenko

Irkutsk communists, saddened by the resignation of their idol Sergei Levchenko, decided to fall into a fighting frenzy.

As they say, DB)

The inevitable question arises: is this a local story or will soon we hear similar rhetoric from the federal speakers of the communists? Common sense dictates that status politicians from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation will now try to blame everything on the locals and distance themselves from such speeches. The very faint parting word of Levchenko himself speaks of this - the former governor clearly did not dare to raise the degree of scandal. However, I doubt that this obkom battle cry would have been possible without the sanction of Levchenko and Zyuganov.

Governor Levchenko's resignation has always been a matter of time. The communist governor who defeated the United Russia candidate in the 2015 elections was too unconventional for the CPRF candidates from the outset. Almost 20 years in legislative assemblies should not be misleading - Mr. Levchenko wanted power and stubbornly went to it.

And when I got there, it turned out that there was no difference between the two largest parties. It is possible to propose to revive collective farms and at the same time to spend a third of the year on business trips abroad, in one year to fail both the fight against fires and the elimination of the consequences of floods. You can explain all the failures by attacks from Moscow and at the same time continue to cover up unexpectedly corrupt associates.

But the president doesn't like to be fired in hot pursuit. Therefore, Levchenko is leaving only now, after the launch of the Power of Siberia gas pipeline. The new governor will be responsible for the branch to the Kovykta field. Verified, reliable, your own.

The government looks more and more like an old, poorly functioning and hopelessly clogged filter that is not changed for lack of a new one.

The publication of opinion polls that indicate the desire of the majority of Russian citizens to change the government can hardly be surprising. The government in Russia has always been unpopular. As for the recent years, at times the negative emotions of the population deliberately diverted to the government and personally to Dmitry Medvedev, so there is nothing surprising in his low ratings.

What is original about the current situation?

Originality in the uncontrollability of what is happening. The Medvedev government is so obviously unpopular that it would be good to replace it, and this puts Vladimir Putin in an awkward position: to dismiss the government means to succumb to pressure, not to dismiss means to show solidarity with him, thereby increasing mistrust of himself personally. Both are unpleasant and fraught with problems in the future. Nevertheless, while Medvedev remains in office and, perhaps, this situation will not change soon.

Medvedev's government

Medvedev's government was unpopular even before the presidential elections, and one of the expectations of even a completely loyal part of the population from them was to change the government. But for internal or personal reasons, Putin decided to leave Medvedev after the elections, which, it seems, changed the whole situation.

For several years, Russian citizens were accustomed to the idea that all the good things came from the president, and all the bad things came from the government in which the liberals had “settled.” And suddenly, after the elections, Putin reappointed Medvedev and almost the entire cabinet, demonstrating his trust in the structure and personalities who they do not inspire any confidence in the population and do not enjoy any popularity.

It is quite possible that the Kremlin did not even think about how much it was "against the grain", against public sentiment. However, why be surprised if Siluanov publicly admits that he did not think how difficult it would be to discuss the "pension reform"? It seems that over the years of the superpopularity of Putin and the Russian power in his person, officials have finally stopped paying attention to such trifles as public expectations and demands.

Raising the retirement age, which is called "pension reform" in semi-official circles, is the most important stage in relations between the authorities and society in recent years, and we will understand its true meaning later. It would seem that this is why Putin needed to preserve this unpopular government after his re-election: to accuse him of unpopular reform and finally dismiss him, causing at least some rise in enthusiasm and good expectations among Russians. And it seemed that this was the way things were going: all summer, the Duma opposition parties unanimously scolded the government and promised voters that the president would not allow an increase in the retirement age, he would sort it out and punish those who dared to offend the people.

But the denouement was really unexpected: for the second time in less than a year, Putin stepped out from behind the scenes and actually took responsibility for everything that happened, supporting the White House. Naturally, the unity with the unpopular cabinet of ministers ultimately affected the president's ratings: the thesis, popular among radical critics of the government, that there is no difference between the president and the government, and that this is one company, began to spread in much wider circles, reinforced by resentment for obvious betrayal - Was this why millions of people, whether voluntarily or compulsorily, came to the polling stations in March and supported Putin, so that he would do this to them later?

Forced irremovability

Why can't Putin just take and dismiss the Medvedev government?

In fact, there are many reasons for this, but they all lie outside the bounds of public policy.

To begin with, according to the concepts of our elite, neither Medvedev nor other ministers can simply be taken and fired. This is an ordinary person at any moment, one way or another, but put in the frost in what the mother gave birth to and not at all worry about how he will live further. Not so with the officials: they all need to be attached, moreover, to good positions.

It is especially difficult to find a place for a well-deserved ally and former President Medvedev. For him, you first need to design a significant and solid post and only then remove it from the government. Ministers and deputy prime ministers also need to offer something, but all the popular "feeding troughs" have already been distributed among the right people and it is not so easy to organize at least ten prestigious and profitable sinecures.

But another question is much more acute: whom to appoint instead?

After Kasyanov's resignation and before Putin himself was premiership, Russia knew only one type of prime minister - a technical one. After Putin's return, for the seventh year, which, by the way, is longer than all the years of Fradkov and Zubkov's premierships, Russia has invariably been living under the unpopular Prime Minister Medvedev. That is, changing the government, Putin needs to create a completely new configuration of power.

The technical head of the government is now completely unprofitable for Putin - with an imperceptible prime minister, the president is responsible for everything bad and no one else. Now Putin would need an authoritative and well-known politician, who would be perceived as an independent figure, from whom he could later make an excellent "whipping boy." But, first of all, where? Only Sergei Lavrov and Sergei Shoigu are relatively known among the population in the government, but none of them looks like an expert in economics and social affairs, and their popularity is localized among the jingoistic public.

Suppose that the appointment of Shoigu or Lavrov as prime minister will even cause a short burst of enthusiasm and expectations of change, but given the difficult socio-economic conditions, one can expect a quick and deep decline in the popularity of the new cabinet. As a result, the last popular figures in Putin's entourage will disappear and he will be left alone with all the problems of domestic and foreign policy.

Secondly, no matter who the new prime minister is, his appointment and the formation of a cabinet presupposes a complex system of harmonizing the interests of various groups in the president’s circle. Given the complex relationship between the clans in power, this process can be not only lengthy and difficult, but even destructive for the entire power vertical.

Third, a prime minister with the rudiments of personal popularity may turn out to be too ambitious and, at a crucial moment, prefer to save his reputation and his prospects, rather than lend a shoulder to the president. These, it seems, are the main obstacles on the way of Sergei Sobyanin to the high post. In addition, in his case the question arises as to whom to leave Moscow. Considering the importance of the capital in the life of Russia, too much depends on the answer to it, and it is bad with candidates in power. It is enough to look at what dull official is being brought to the post of the head of St. Petersburg in order to assess the scale of staff shortage within the system.

Delayed Sacrifice

The easiest way for the president not to multiply problems is to play for time and not change anything, which is actually happening. Despite the fact that the difference between the president and the government is becoming less and less distinguishable, the government still takes on a certain amount of negativity that would otherwise fall directly on the president. The government today is an old, poorly functioning and hopelessly clogged filter, which is not changed because there is no new one, and the presence of at least such a filter is better than its absence.

Now, in hindsight, it is clear why radical changes in the government did not follow immediately after the elections: after raising the retirement age, any cabinet and any prime minister would be just as unpopular, and by the beginning of 2019 the demand for change would be as keen as he is now.

Perhaps by keeping Medvedev in high office over and over again, Putin simply means that much more serious challenges lie ahead for the population and its relationship to power. Raising the retirement age is not the last unpleasant surprise. In this case, it is logical to play for time and use the services of the faithful Medvedev in full so that he can take on the maximum and resign when the situation is very tense.

Extreme step

The resignation of the government in the current situation is an extreme step that can be taken once in many years. It was early Putin, against the background of his growing rating, who could afford the luxury of having technical prime ministers and swapping one for another as needed. Putin, who is losing popularity, is forced to treat the change of government with exaggerated caution: if you do everything at the wrong time and do not guess with the staff, then instead of a respite, he can get something completely different - an even stronger collapse of his own rating against the background of people's disappointment from the new government and from the prime minister and from the very situation of personnel leapfrog.

But even if we manage to please people with a new prime minister, it is difficult to imagine a situation in which the Russian economy would suddenly start to recover and people would be seized with optimism. In the context of growing socio-economic difficulties, even the most popular figure in Putin's entourage in a matter of months may turn out to be an even more toxic prime minister than Medvedev.

Unlike the first presidential terms, a change of government now or in the foreseeable future is a harbinger of great changes at all levels, even if everything is done in an attempt to maintain stability. For many years of appearing in the top lines of the table of ranks, Medvedev has nevertheless become one of the backbone figures of the current regime. Therefore, it cannot be replaced painlessly for the president, while there is no one to change it, as already mentioned, with anyone else: except for the former and current guards and aging friends of youth, Putin has no one left in reserve.

Fyodor Krasheninnikov, political scientist, publicist