Two Olegs

As soon as Oleg Kondrashov officially declared his bid for the post of city manager, he immediately threw a bone to the district heads, hinting that their powers would be expanded. This was a clear signal to the heads, one they apparently understood. Even before that, Oleg Sorokin had toured the city's districts and made it clear to some of the heads that they were firmly seated in their posts: for example, Valery Moiseyev in Sormovsky District and Vladimir Soldatenkov in Avtozavodsky District.

For his part, city manager Kondrashov gave his blessing to acting head Andrei Chertkov as head of Prioksky District — although under Bulavinov the City Council had blocked his confirmation as deputy mayor. Next, Kondrashov installed his own man, Gennady Zotin, in Moscow District.

But the head of Kanavinsky District, Nikolai Sataev, is the governor's man. And neither Sorokin nor Kondrashov is able to win him over.

In Nizhegorodsky District, head Andrei Tarasov has been left in limbo, formally because of his run in the elections to the Regional Legislative Assembly of Nizhny Novgorod Region. In all likelihood there will be haggling between Sorokin and Kondrashov over who takes Tarasov's place: will it be Sorokin's man or Kondrashov's? Most likely, Nizhegorodsky District will be left to Governor Shantsev, since the The Kremlin is located there.

The question of Sovetsky and Leninsky District districts has been postponed. One might assume this happened for political reasons. It seems there is reluctance to hand Leninsky District over to the influential Legislative Assembly deputy Citizen Zhuk, and some alternative will be offered to him as compensation. Alexander Bochkaryov may still be sent to Sovetsky District, but not now — only after the elections to the Regional Legislative Assembly. Otherwise, why take a pause that keeps «United Russia» from lowering «A Just Russia»'s results?

During the actual adoption of the new structure of the Nizhny Novgorod administration, a full-blown battle broke out over the district heads. Oleg Kondrashov made a fairly crude mistake — he proposed stripping the heads of their status as deputy heads of the city administration. It's clear that city manager Kondrashov was taken in by the attractive idea of cutting the number of his deputies to a minimum of six or seven. And here were a full eight deputies who could easily be stripped of their status.

Oleg Sorokin realized this was his chance to bring the district heads under his own wing. Together with deputies of the City Council, he insisted that they retain the title "deputy head of the city administration." And Kondrashov, once he understood what was at stake, agreed, not without some grumbling — reasoning that it didn't matter what epaulets they wore, as long as their powers were in order.

But it looks like the district heads will actually end up with fewer powers. After all, the Nizhny Novgorod administration has become stronger — at whose expense? At the expense of what remained of the district heads' former influence. It's no accident that some of them have grumbled about the weakening of their authority.

It seems this was precisely the angle Sorokin wanted to soften by leaving the epaulets to Moiseyev, Soldatenkov, Sataev, Chertkov, Zotin, and Tarasov.

Party-political disagreements between the two Olegs have also come to light, most sharply in Sovetsky District. Oleg Kondrashov needs to deliver the party a good result, on a par with Bulavinov's. One growth point is Sovetsky District, where United Russia" clearly struggled in the October 2010 municipal elections. Sorokin has exactly the opposite plans here. Oleg Sorokin's man, Alexei Kolobov, has been spotted in the regional group of "A Just Russia." And for him to become a deputy of the Legislative Assembly, the winner in District No. 8 must not be the "United Russia" candidate, UNN (Lobachevsky University) rector Chuprunov), but the "A Just Russia" candidate, Alexander Kosovskikh. And "A Just Russia" needs to reap a record harvest of votes at "United Russia"'s expense.

Around this there have reportedly already been discussions at the level of Governor Valery Shantsev and Viktor Lunin, secretary of the regional political council. It seems Sorokin was given to understand that he had placed his own interests above the party's. And who is surprised by that? Much the same thing happened on October 25, when Bulavinov was stripped of the post of city head.

This means that one of the Olegs definitely has no restraining center of power. And war is only a matter of time — cold at first, then hot. Right now the friction is still going on, but confined to the sandbox — childish, in short. But soon it will get serious. Just give it time.