Sardana Avksentieva returned to her roots – Kommersant

Sardana Avksentiev, deputy head of the New People faction in the State Duma, will head the party list in the September elections to the State Assembly of Yakutia. After the victory, she will give up her mandate in favor of the “young and fresh”, that is, she will act in the classic role of an electoral “locomotive”. With such a leader in the list, the New People are counting on the second largest parliamentary faction in the State Council. Experts are more skeptical: the party lacks other recognizable candidates.

Sardana Avksentyeva spoke about her intention to take part in the regional election campaign of the New People on Thursday on the air of the Rossiya 24 TV channel: “… since Yakutia is my native region, of course, I pay special attention to this, our party decided that I I will head the party list to the State Assembly – Il Tumen.

The politician admitted that she would act as a “locomotive” – ​​a status candidate who helps the party with campaigning, but after the elections she refuses the mandate in favor of the next one on the list. This is often done by United Russia using the current governors. In the elections to the State Assembly five years ago, the first number of United Russia (ER) was the acting head of Yakutia, Aisen Nikolaev. According to Kommersant’s information, he may head the list of EP this year as well.

“This (promotion.— “b”) is done in order to fully implement the legislation on campaigning. There are certain obstacles: who can participate directly in the campaign,” Sardana Avksentyeva explained. “So that I can go through the entire pre-election period together with our candidates, support them. There are a lot of young, fresh faces, people with new views.”

The secretary of the Yakut branch of the New People, businessman Vasily Nikolaev, told Kommersant that the party would nominate candidates in all single-mandate districts of the republic, and would also form a party list of 50-70 people. The State Assembly, we recall, consists of 35 “single-mandate members” and 35 “list members”. “This is the first election when our party goes to be elected to Il Tumen, and in general the first election of such a scale where we take part,” said Mr. Nikolaev, adding that the party “pragmatically” counts on 6–12 seats out of 70. This is an application to the second largest faction in the parliament of Yakutia. Now there are 47 deputies of the United Russia, 10 – the Communist Party, 9 – “Fair Russia – For the Truth”, 4 – the Liberal Democratic Party. At the same time, Mr. Nikolaev found it difficult to name the entire top three of the future list: “The second number, most likely, will be me. A third candidate has not yet been identified.”

Yakut politicians assess the chances of success for the Duma newcomers under the leadership of Sardana Avksentyeva in different ways. Her former colleague and ex-deputy of the State Council Vladimir Fedorov believes that the list of “New People” will be able to overcome the five percent barrier, but it is not taken to predict the exact number of mandates. A source in the republican executive committee of the United Russia claims that the party in power is not afraid of Ms. Avksentieva: Yakutians can remember that she “traded” her job as mayor for life in Moscow as a State Duma deputy: “Nothing shines for her.”

Recall that in 2018, in the elections for the mayor of Yakutsk, Ms. Avksentieva “replaced” Vladimir Fedorov, who was removed by the court, and won the vote on the wave of protest, and subsequently gained fame as the “people’s” mayor. However, in 2020 she resigned for health reasons, but in September 2021 she was elected to the State Duma, becoming the second number on the federal list of New People (immediately after party chairman Alexei Nechaev).

However, at that time, New People in Yakutia received one of the best results in the country: 9.9% of voters in the region voted for them (the party won 5.3% across the country). There were more only in Buryatia (11.2%) and Kalmykia (12.2%). Interestingly, according to Kommersant’s information, another headliner of the New People, ex-kaveenshchik, and now a State Duma deputy, Sangadzhi Tarbaev, is not going to head the party list in his homeland.

The New People have not yet said whether they will nominate their candidate for the gubernatorial elections, which will also be held in September. According to Vasily Nikolaev, if there is a candidate, it is definitely not him. Sardana Avksentieva and the press service of the party refused to comment on this topic to Kommersant. The current head of United Russia, Aisen Nikolaev, has already announced plans to be re-elected for a second term.

Olga Parfenova, head of the Department of History, Social Science and Political Science at the North-Eastern Federal University named after Ammosov, believes that there is increased attention to Sardana Avksentyeva at the federal level, but the residents of Yakutia “know both her strengths and weaknesses better.” She doubts that the politician will be able to give the party more than one or two mandates: “After all, apart from herself, practically no one is known here, even Vasily Nikolaev himself,” the expert says.

The party has no other recognizable people in Yakutia, so the nomination of Sardana Avksentyeva as a “locomotive” was expected, political analyst Rostislav Turovsky believes. He is confident that the New People will gain more than 5% in the elections and receive a certain number of seats in the regional parliament, but it is difficult to predict their exact number. It will depend on the performance in the districts, where it is still difficult to assess “how strong and large the team of candidates is,” the expert says. However, New People have potential chances for a significant faction, Mr. Turovsky believes: “This is partly due to the fact that the rating of United Russia in the republic is not the highest and someone has to take part of the United Russia electorate.”

Andrey Ashes; Nikolai Borisov, Yakutsk