Republican Party Lineup Agreed – Kasyanov

Ex-premier Mikhail Kasyanov, a senior member of the newly legal Republican Party, said in his twitter blog that the party’s lineup had been agreed.

The party is expected to meet on June 16 to finalize its composition, program and campaign plans. The next parliamentary elections in Russia are expected in 2016.

On May 10, the Russian Justice Ministry formally restored registration of the liberal Republican Party of Russia, allowing it to participate in elections. The previously banned anti-Kremlin liberal Parnas party, with Kasyanov as its leader, hopes to use the newly registered party as its own springboard to registration.

The Republican Party was set up in 1990 and banned by the Supreme Court in 2007 as part of the Kremlin’s broad campaign to weed out Russia’s political party scene. In 2010, the Republicans joined the Parnas group of anti-Kremlin liberals.

The restoration of the Republicans comes hot on the heels of a broad reform to liberalize political legislation, introduced by the Kremlin in the wake of this winter’s mass street protests and expected to usher in dozens of new political parties.

 

Leave a comment