Volgograd is thinking about Stalingrad again – Picture of the Day – Kommersant

In the Volgograd region, a public council began its work to study the opinion of its inhabitants on the renaming of the regional center to Stalingrad. At the council’s first meeting on December 5, Governor Andrey Bocharov called the city’s former name “a symbol of the courage and heroism” of the people, but stressed that the decision to rename should be made “only on the basis of the position of the residents.” The expert believes that in the case of a real survey, residents will speak out against it.

Opening the first meeting of the public council, Governor Andrei Bocharov said that the discussion had begun in accordance with the decision of the plenum of the regional council of veterans. On November 19, on the day of the 80th anniversary of the start of the counter-offensive of the Soviet troops near Stalingrad, the front-line soldiers spoke in favor of “returning to the city of Volgograd the name of the legendary unconquered Stalingrad – a symbol of courage and heroism of the multinational people of our Motherland in the Great Patriotic War and the entire Second World War.”

According to the press service of the regional administration, the public council included representatives of parties, public associations, trade unions and communities, enterprises and organizations, educational institutions and experts.

“The task of the public council is not easy and very responsible,” Mr. Bocharov noted. “It is necessary to carry out a qualitative, comprehensive preliminary study of the public opinion of the inhabitants of the Volgograd region, the hero city, on the issue of returning the name Stalingrad to the city of Volgograd. And to present the results of the study to the general public. We count on a very responsible attitude and high-quality work of the members of the public council. Based on the results of your work, the residents of Volgograd and the Volgograd Region will make decisions of truly historic significance.” At the same time, the decision to rename “should be made only on the basis of the position of the residents,” the governor emphasized. He also added that “the most objective result” will give the identification of public opinion using the referendum procedure.

Recall that in July 2022 Andrey Bocharov signed amendments to the law “On the administrative-territorial structure of the Volgograd region”, concerning the issues of naming and renaming settlements. The previous version of the law stated that the Volgograd Regional Duma is considering proposals for renaming and revealing the opinion of the population “by polling citizens.”

The new version of the paragraph on the survey is no longer there: it only says that in order to identify the opinion of the population, the regional duma sends these documents to the representative body of the corresponding municipality within five days from the date of acceptance for consideration of the proposal to rename.

And that within 45 days must decide on the expression of consent or disagreement with the renaming.

These amendments caused a wide public outcry: many social media users considered them the first step towards renaming Volgograd to Stalingrad. However, Governor Bocharov then opposed the renaming of territories and settlements without taking into account the opinion of residents.

The question of renaming Volgograd has been raised at least twice in the last ten years alone. In 2013, the leader of the Communist Party faction in the regional Duma, Nikolai Parshin, insisted that the return of the Stalingrad name to the city was “correct from a legal and historical point of view.” The Communists even planned to apply to the Supreme Court with a claim to invalidate the decision of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR in 1961 to rename Stalingrad to Volgograd, but it was never filed. And in 2021, Zakhar Prilepin, co-chairman of A Just Russia – For Truth, spoke about renaming: at a press conference in Volgograd, he called the return of the city its former name “an application for a super-breakthrough, for building a new socialism, for dominance in the territory of Eurasia.”

Political scientist Alexander Saigin believes that in the current socio-political situation, the renaming of Volgograd is unlikely, since in the case of a real survey, the majority of residents, in his opinion, will speak out against it. At the same time, there are no studies that could objectively reflect the attitude of citizens to changing the name of Volgograd, the expert admits. Although he himself believes that the initiative to return the name of Stalingrad “will undermine the rating of both the governor and the federal government.”

Sergey Petunin, Saratov