Chris Doss The Russia Journal ---------------------------- Vremya MN May 28, 2002 THE FATE OF THE COMMUNISTS What the latest developments may mean for the Communist Party Author: Leonid Radzikhovsky [from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html] POLITICALLY, THE DISASTROUS SITUATION OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY IS APPARENT. THIS DISASTER IS A LOGICAL COROLLARY OF THE POLICY PURSUED BY ZYUGANOV, SELEZNEV, KUPTSOV, AND ALL COMMUNIST FUNCTIONARIES. THEIR TOTAL PARALYSIS OF WILL IS OBVIOUS.
The CPRF is not going to gain any propaganda mileage out of it. Nobody is going to be stirred by the expulsion. Average communist voters have only the barest inkling of who Seleznev is. Goryacheva and Gubenko and their Duma committees are even less known. Expulsion of the trio was the last attempt at self-preservation for the Communist Party, no more. Had the functionaries openly defying the party been allowed to remain members, it would have been a sign that the party does not exist, even formally. No one would have been foolish enough to obey the decisions of the party.
All these are just the purely formal details, of course. Politically, the disastrous situation of the Communist Party is apparent. This disaster is a logical corollary of the policy pursued by Zyuganov, Seleznev, Kuptsov, and all communist functionaries. Their total paralysis of will is obvious.
The Communist Party is led rather than leading, is reactive rather than proactive, in big-time politics and in its own internal affairs. The whole intrigue was initiated by the presidential administration, which had the Communists kicked out of the Duma committees first, and then restored there. The Communist Party merely watched the proceedings open-mouthed, trying to keep an eye on all the cards up the sleeves of Voloshin and Surkov.
Will the Communist Party split?
Ordinary party members do not care about Seleznev, but the elite will probably split.
In fact, the presidential administration is clearly trying to push the Communist Party from the office opposition into the streets. The Duma machinery has been taken away from the Communists, and moderate leaders have run away. The hard-liners will inevitably come to the forefront now. This means a complete political and psychological disaster for the party functionaries.
These Soviet apparatchicks reject all revolutionary, risky, unpredictable, or even simply energetic moves. This is Zyuganov's problem. A respectable man, he is forced to play the role of a rebel. It isn't hard to predict that the Communist Party will collapse if it runs into a revolutionary situation. What does the presidential administration need it for? Whom will the Kremlin and its political consultants fight when the Communist Party is no more? There are two possible answers here. First: the presidential administration has gone too far and will soon back-track. The Kremlin will pull the Communist Party out of the swamp into which it has driven it. Second: the presidential administration knows what it's doing. The Kremlin has a plan for reforms, so substantial that it will not have time to play with the Communist Party any longer, and needs a more controllable Duma.