State Duma deputies will hold events in schools and universities dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the Constitution of the Russian Federation

This week State Duma deputies will hold events in schools and universities dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the Constitution of the Russian Federation. Earlier, the chairman of the lower house, Vyacheslav Volodin, instructed the relevant Duma committees to organize thematic meetings of vice-speakers and faction leaders with students. It is also planned that parliamentarians will participate in school lessons “Conversations about Important Things” dedicated to the Constitution. The expert notes that open lectures by politicians to students or schoolchildren have so far not been a very popular format of work.

The instruction to two Duma committees – on science and higher education and on enlightenment – to organize events in universities and schools dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the adoption of the Constitution (it was approved by popular vote on December 12, 1993), the chairman of the lower house Vyacheslav Volodin gave at a council meeting Duma on November 27 (Kommersant has an extract from the minutes). The Science Committee was tasked with holding meetings of vice-speakers and faction leaders with students until December 12, and the Education Committee, together with the relevant federal ministry, was to work on the issue of holding “Talking about Important Things” lessons in schools on the topic of the Basic Law.

“This year, on Constitution Day, December 12, open lessons on the Constitution are planned, which will be conducted by State Duma deputies regardless of party affiliation,” Anna Skroznikova, a member of the Duma Committee on Education, told Kommersant (“New people”).— I myself plan to conduct such an open lesson with high school students at school and with students at the university, because I consider this an important event. The current Constitution is a direct law, and we must actively tell schoolchildren and students about this.”

Mr. Volodin’s deputies, as Kommersant found out, intend to carry out his instructions in the coming days. For example, Deputy Speaker Sergei Neverov (“United Russia”) will speak on December 11 at the Academy of Labor and Social Relations. Vice-Speaker Anna Kuznetsova (ER) will hold a meeting with MSU students on the same day.

Her faction colleague, First Deputy Chairman of the Duma Alexander Zhukov, also plans to speak at this university, but he has not yet decided on the date of the lecture. Finally, in the office of another vice-speaker from United Russia, Alexei Gordeev, according to his press service, such an event was also discussed, but the issue has not yet been resolved, and “most likely, the meeting will take place after December 12.”

Chairman of the State Duma Committee on State Construction and Legislation Pavel Krasheninnikov (“United Russia”) told Kommersant that since September he had been giving lectures on the Constitution at universities in different cities – Kazan, Yekaterinburg, Moscow. In addition, in November he participated in the “Kutafin Readings”, organized by the Moscow State Law University named after O. Kutafin, and on December 7 – in the “Yakovlev Readings” at RANEPA (Oleg Kutafin and Veniamin Yakovlev took an active part in the development of the 1993 Constitution).

Leader of the party and Duma faction “A Just Russia – For the Truth” Sergei Mironov, as Kommersant was told in his press service, together with the Minister of Education Sergei Kravtsov will go to the Moscow region, where on December 11 he will give a lesson for students in grades 8–11 of the regional gymnasium named after E. M. Primakov on the topic “The Main law of the land.”

U LDPR Constitution Day coincided with an internal party holiday. “All our deputies must hold meetings: 30 years of the Constitution, 30 years of the victory of the LDPR,” Yaroslav Nilov, a member of the Liberal Democratic faction, chairman of the Duma Committee on Labor and Social Relations, explained to Kommersant. (We would like to remind you that on December 12, 1993, simultaneously with the referendum on the Constitution, elections to the State Duma of the first convocation were held, and the LDPR won the party list vote with 22.92% of the votes.) Mr. Nilov himself already held a meeting on December 8 with students of Synergy University. “Since I was part of the group preparing proposals for amendments to the Constitution in 2020, my students, future lawyers, and I discussed why it was impossible to hold a referendum on the amendments, how a nationwide vote was proposed and a legal structure was found to hold it,”— the deputy said.

Press Secretary Communist Party of the Russian FederationState Duma deputy Alexander Yushchenko told Kommersant that he is not yet aware of the participation of representatives of his faction in open lessons on the Constitution.

Let us note that in the summer of 2020, during the all-Russian vote on amendments to the Basic Law, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation announced the start of work on its own draft Constitution. In November 2022, the leader of the Communist Party Gennady Zyuganov at the party plenum reminded about these plans: the communists planned to complete work on the project by the end of 2023.

“Open lectures by politicians to students or schoolchildren are not a very popular format of work,” says Pavel Sklyanchuk, a member of the Russian Public Relations Association. “But the 30th anniversary of the State Duma is a good reason to work on improving the image of parliament in the eyes of the younger generation. In a good way, such educational work should be carried out constantly, and on a scientific basis.”

Ksenia Veretennikova, Andrey Prah