The Moscow City Duma adopted in the first reading a new scheme of electoral districts

The profile commission of the Moscow City Duma (MGD) on Monday approved a draft of a new division of single-mandate constituencies, which will be used in the elections to the Moscow City Duma in the fall of 2024. Deputy Chairman of the Moscow City Election Commission Dmitry Reut explained to deputies that the authors of the updated scheme were guided solely by the principle of respecting the representative equality of voters and recommended not to compare it with the outdated version of ten years ago.

New district scheme on the election of deputies of the capital’s parliament, the Moscow City Election Commission (MGEC) introduced it into the Moscow City Duma on December 20. The borders of 33 out of 45 districts underwent visually noticeable changes, while another 12 were affected to a lesser extent or not at all.

During the presentation of the scheme at a meeting of the profile commission of the Moscow City Duma for state construction and local self-government, Dmitry Reut reminded deputies that the division of districts, according to the law, is updated every ten years (the next deadline is April 2024) and takes into account, first of all, the principle of respect for representative equality: each a deputy must represent approximately an equal number of voters (about 170 thousand with a permissible deviation of 10–20%).

It was the enforcement of this norm, Mr. Reut pointed out, that required in some cases “to divide the territories of districts,” that is, to include their different parts in different districts. “It would not be entirely correct to compare the presented project with the scheme that was approved in 2014,” said the deputy chairman of the IPCC. “And this is obvious! Life does not stand still, the city is developing, a lot of construction is underway: one house has been built – and there is already a significant change in the number of voters.”

Although in some places it was still possible to “repeat the borders,” the speaker added.

In general, the connection to the territory for a deputy is a rather conditional phenomenon, continued Dmitry Reut: “The deputy represents the interests not only of the voters who voted for him, but the interests of all Moscow residents.” He also emphasized that the IPCC had the right to introduce a new scheme before February 9, but did so back in December, “so that everyone would have more time to familiarize themselves and build work for the future.” “I hope this will be assessed positively,” the deputy chairman of the IPCC noted significantly.

The only member of the commission who did not respond to this wish was Right Russia member Mikhail Timonov (included Ministry of Justice to the register of foreign agents), who considered that the project “does not fully comply” with the general ban on including part of a district into a district (except for cases when this is necessary to comply with the norm of representation): “Is it possible to divide Moscow into 45 districts with mandatory compliance with this conditions? Yes, you can, my colleagues and I have done the work and drawn up such a scheme.” “Although here we see some signs of this terrible concept of “gerrymandering” (redistricting to change the balance of political forces.— “Kommersant”), we propose not to reject the project right away, to support it, but at the same time give time for revision and make amendments,” the deputy suggested.

In response, Dmitry Reut indicated that the project had received all the necessary conclusions for compliance with legislative norms, and “regarding gerrymandering” he said that such a practice “was carried out in the state that considers itself the most democratic, precisely in such a way that different numbers of people were formed constituencies.”

As a result, the commission supported the IPCC and recommended adopting the draft in the first reading and in the absence of amendments as a whole.

Political scientist Alexander Kynev is confident that it was possible to re-draw the districts taking into account the updated average number of voters without violating the boundaries of the districts: “I think that this is “gerrymandering” and an attempt to worsen the chances of opposition candidates and improve the chances of pro-government candidates.”

The new cut is not voluntarism, but the fulfillment of the requirements of the law on clarifying the boundaries of districts in connection with changes in population, argues political scientist Alexander Asafov. “Gerrymandering” refers to the American technology of changing borders for a specific candidate, but in our case there is no changing borders for political purposes, but only compliance with the requirements of the law, the expert insists. And from this point of view, according to him, the boundaries of the districts of both deputies from the pro-government association “My Moscow” and the opposition have changed – where the number of residents has changed. Based on even a cursory analysis, we can conclude that the new configuration is closer to the administrative boundaries of districts and districts, Mr. Asafov emphasizes: if now one deputy has to interact with two or three prefectures, then in the future he will work with one.

Grigory Leyba, Anastasia Kornya