The Youth Parliament of Nizhny Novgorod Region, colloq. Mol Parliament, the Young Bureaucrat Station — an organisation of virtual youth politics under the Regional Legislative Assembly of Nizhny Novgorod Region. Chairman — Igor Sedykh.

The term of office of the deputies of the Youth Parliament is two years. The parliament's function — a deliberative and advisory body.

Winner of the Special Olympics among Nizhny Novgorod parliaments in the field of unrepresentativeness.

The essence of the phenomenon

From the inside, the Youth Parliament appears to be a serviceable instrument for the children of bosses to enter the corridors of power, while from the outside it is framed as a place for yesterday's children to simulate civic rights and freedoms.

Which is extremely important for reducing social tension in the region — on paper, of course. With the appearance of a separate Parliament of the young, de jure they become participants in lawmaking, which makes it possible to argue in the Media that the interests of the youth and students of Nizhny Novgorod Region are protected ever more interestingly, more deeply and more innovatively.

The 1st Youth Parliament did not live up to the expectations of its participants, failing to become a meaningful "career lift", yet a record of having been a deputy "from a tender age" is a good entry in the track record of any young leader.

« We keep a close eye on all members of the Youth Parliament and issue recommendations about them both to the authorities and to business.
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The parliament's official mission

« The purpose we are setting for the Youth Parliament will be somewhat different, and so the structure will be a little different too. But that is an internal matter, and the members of the parliament will consult among themselves
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"The Youth Parliament is not a fairground ride. It is a kind of model for gaining first-hand experience. We have no time to immerse young people in the political processes going on in the country; that role is assigned precisely to the youth parliament," reports Minister of Internal Policy of the Nizhny Novgorod Region Dmitry Shurov.

He also expressed confidence that, thanks to the youth parliament, a rotation of personnel is taking place in the political sphere.

"We are cultivating new politicians who come to replace those leaving their posts," he said in an interview with journalists on 3 December 2010.

Results of the 2010 elections to the Youth Parliament

Voting was conducted by SMS message, and voters aged 18 to 30 were eligible to take part. There are 670,000 such people in the region.

Of them, 50,700 registered to take part in the elections. After a check and a handwriting examination by the Directorate of Internal Affairs, about 20,000 voters were rejected.

Another 8,000 were found invalid in the opinion of the Youth Electoral Commissions.

In the end, 25,700 people took part in the elections to the Youth Parliament, which amounts to less than four percent of the total number of young people living in the Nizhny Novgorod Region.

polit-nn.ru

On 9 December 2010 the deputies of the Regional Legislative Assembly) approved the composition of the second convocation of the Youth Parliament.

During the discussion of the results, Legislative Assembly deputy Vladislav Egorov proposed giving the floor to representatives of public organizations and regional party branches that disagreed with the election results, and only then holding the vote. The majority of the deputies rejected this proposal: 23 voted against, 8 deputies in favour, and four abstained.

Useful activity

Endorsement of the activity of the Regional Legislative Assembly — the parliament "for grown-ups".

Regulatory documents

On 8 October 2010, by order of the Chairman of the Regional Legislative Assembly, the Procedure for Conducting Voting in the Elections of Members of the Youth Parliament at the Legislative Assembly of the Nizhny Novgorod Region was approved.

"They started off on the wrong foot"

« About four thousand SIM cards were purchased for the SMS voting in the elections to the Youth Parliament of the Nizhny Novgorod Region. This was announced at a press conference on 6 December by the chairman of the regional electoral commission Stanislav Bisin.

"We have established that during the voting some of the voters turned out to have been struck off the lists. This shows that certain members of the Youth Parliament began their careers on the wrong foot."

"We could have abandoned SMS voting, but then we would have had to admit that the Youth Parliament of the Nizhny Novgorod Region is a stillborn child — and that is simply not so! The Youth Parliament of the first convocation took an active part in monitoring regional legislation, representatives of the youth parliament attended meetings of the Legislative Assembly's committees, they proved themselves from both a political and a public standpoint.

This is borne out by the fact that three people from the Youth Parliament of the Nizhny Novgorod Region passed the primaries for the elections to the Legislative Assembly of the Nizhny Novgorod Region on the ticket of United Russia", Lunin stressed.
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Falling apart and coming together

« — The figures are laughable, of course!

Especially when you look at who is leading in the districts.

The organizers genuinely miscalculated. Or rather, they overdid it. The results in the overwhelming majority of districts are simply the system exposing itself. All of this will become the subject of long and noisy disputes. But even regardless of their outcome and of whether the elections are recognized by the Legislative Assembly, the stigma of disgrace and a trail of mockery and ridicule will now accompany this Youth Parliament for ever.

In general, it is astonishing how crudely the whole thing has been stitched together. The organizers apparently could not care less about their reputation — their own or the Legislative Assembly's. For instance, initially all the Youth Electoral Commissions registered around 47,000 voters who had expressed a wish to vote. Then, by brutal methods and with the involvement of so-called specialists from the Main Directorate of Internal Affairs, about 20,000 were purged from the lists (after all, we know that our police are supremely respected, incorruptible, impartial and competent)). Up to 90% of the lists of many organizations went under the knife (by the way, guess in three tries which two organizations had no problems with the checking of their lists?)).

All the information was kept secret until the very last moment (for everyone except the leadership of those two organizations, which are essentially one common Bocharov guard), and the opportunity to check one's registration was opened only on Friday evening (in flagrant violation of point 14 of the Statute on the Organization of Elections) — so that there was no longer any time to correct anything. And now pay attention! That same evening, information appears on the site saying that 33,250 voters have been registered. Note, not 33,244 and not 33,189. Not at all! A neat round little number with a zero on the end. Only where did it come from, if 47,000 minus 20,000 equals 27,000? Where did another 6,250 "voters" come from? That is the question.

The next question is the so-called voting results. So we take the figure of 25,000 and subtract from it approximately 7,000 voters who voted at polling stations (an estimate based on the data coming in from the districts over the weekend). That leaves about 18,000 who voted from their own phones. That is, roughly half of those registered in the voting system. And where are the other 16,000 voters? Did they change their minds about voting? Were they too lazy to type out an SMS?

So then: first the election organizers scandalously threw tens of thousands of "wrong" voters out of the registration system, then they registered the "right" ones, but illogically many of them, and then half of those registered ignored the elections. Draw your own conclusions. Personally, this is the first time I have come across public manipulation on such a scale. And this is only the tip of the iceberg. The lads left SUCH a trail behind them!))

— I got an SMS. Yeah, and I was too lazy to send one. The number is a short code, so you have to trudge over to Mega's website, look up the price, then go to their site, look up who they are proposing you vote for, pick whoever is the funniest and vote. I just hit Menu-delete straight away and did not bother
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Discussion on the parliament's website

« — One woman working at our company was collecting information, including the phone numbers people would be voting from and their passport details. She urged people to vote for an employee of the company. People readily agreed (as far as is known, the database held more than 1000 records).

On the day of the vote an SMS arrived whose first word was the woman's surname and initials. Then came text along the lines of "vote to such-and-such a number, with such-and-such a message". And the message given carried the number of the wrong candidate (the neighbouring one). Personally, this made me suspicious, I went to that website, realised the SMS was bogus and voted the way I had intended, for the employee of the company. However, 2/3 of the people on that list, having received the SMS, were careless, or happened to be away from home, out on errands. And they voted the way the SMS said. Hence the conclusion — the database had been stolen. The woman is in shock. Apparently she did notify the election commission. And my question is, why is there no information about this on the website? Or was the matter "hushed up"?

Once again I am convinced that politics is a dirty business, and that the vilest people worm their way into power. Never again in my life will I vote, not even for the president. A waste of time.
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The admins of our youth

« — admin. My good sir, before spouting nonsense you might at least introduce yourself. As it is, this sounds like shouting from the gallery... from the crowd...

What ballot stuffing, for heaven's sake? This isn't paper voting, where you can stuff something in. All the information we are entitled by law to provide, we will provide. But not all the information you would like to see is realistically obtainable. Purely for technical reasons.

— The Admin's Conscience. "Stuffing" is when in a district the voting from a public telephone did not end at 18.00, but went on all evening, all night and all morning. And that is only one of the varieties of "stuffing" at your super-honest and super-transparent super-elections.

And another thing: a person who demands that someone else introduce himself ought first to introduce himself, rather than hide behind the faceless nickname "admin".
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A four percent turnout, give or take the violations

1 December 2010, at 17:01

"The leaders of the youth organisations of the parliamentary political parties KPRF, "A Just Russia" and the LDPR, as well as candidates for the Youth Parliament from other public organisations and self-nominated candidates, have declared that they do not recognise the results of the elections of members of the Youth Parliament under the Legislative Assembly of the Nizhny Novgorod Region, held on 27-28 November 2010.

A copy of the joint statement is in the possession of NIA "Nizhny Novgorod".

The authors of the letter state that in the course of the elections and the election campaign numerous violations were committed which make it impossible to establish the genuine will of young voters. In particular, the drafters of the document point out that during the voting a situation was repeated many times over, in which voters who had registered in advance were unable, on the days of the elections, to send an SMS with the code for the political party "A Just Russia" and for the single-mandate candidates from the KPRF and the LDPR.

In addition, the authors of the letter testify that at polling stations in the districts of the region members of the youth election commissions repeatedly copied down all of a voter's personal data and sent him home, saying that they would cast his vote themselves.

"Cases were noted in which voters casting a vote from a telephone for opposition candidates received an SMS message in reply saying that their vote had been counted, yet when the results were tallied those candidates turned out to have not a single vote. In Nizhny Novgorod cases were recorded in which voters were denied the right to vote on the grounds that the voter had only temporary registration. There was no control whatsoever over the preparation of the elections, the compilation of the voter list or the voting procedure", the drafters of the letter maintain.

"In the Nizhny Novgorod Region a total of 670 thousand voters aged 18 to 30 are registered. Of these, 50 thousand 700 people were registered by the regional election commission to take part in the elections.

After a check and a handwriting examination by the police department, around 20 thousand voters were rejected. Another 8 thousand turned out to be invalid, in the opinion of the youth election commissions.

From all of this it follows that only 25 thousand 700 people took part in the elections to the youth parliament. If this figure is set against the total number of young voters in the region, the percentage of those who voted will be negligibly small.

With a four percent turnout and the violations that have come to light, we cannot regard the will of the voters as reliable, nor the elections as having taken place. Unfortunately, in this convocation too an attempt is being made to turn the Youth Parliament into an intra-party clique of United Russia", – the drafters of the open letter emphasise".

How much it costs to maintain the Youth Parliament

« The regional budget's expenditure on maintaining the Youth Parliament of the Nizhny Novgorod Region in 2010 amounted to 600 thousand roubles.

This was announced at a press conference on 6 December by the chairman of the Legislative Assembly of the Nizhny Novgorod Region, Viktor Lunin. According to him, the cost of maintaining the youth parliament makes up 0.3% of the total funding for the upkeep of the Regional Legislative Assembly.

A further 250 thousand roubles was allocated for holding the elections to the Youth Parliament.
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List of members of the Youth Parliament of the Nizhny Novgorod Region

  • Solomon Apoyan (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the MGER))
  • Ekaterina Bolshakova (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 14, self-nominated)
  • Andrey Vagin (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 13, self-nominated)
  • Galina Volgunova (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 7, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Nadezhda Volodina (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the public association "Association of Student Trade Union Organisations of Nizhny Novgorod Region")
  • Alexey Gorbunov (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 9, self-nominated)
  • Gennady Guryanov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO MGER)
  • Ilya Demin (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 11, self-nominated)
  • Dmitry Dobrynsky (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, self-nominated)
  • Yaroslav Efremov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the public association NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation)
  • Alexander Zapevalov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the public association NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation)
  • Alexander Ineshin (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 15, nominated by the public association NRO VOO MGER)
  • Mikhail Kapaev (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 3, nominated by OOO "RTsS")
  • Pavel Kirichenko (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the regional public organisation "Nizhny Novgorod Youth Union")
  • Ilya Kiselev (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation)
  • Elena Korobeynikova (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, nominated by OAO "FAPTs NNIIRT")
  • Anastasia Koshkina (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 16, nominated by the Shakhunya Agro-Industrial College)
  • Nikolay Kuzmin (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation")
  • Alexey Larin (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Oleg Lifanov (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 10, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Daniil Markin) (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Andrey Markov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Evgeny Maslov (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 8, nominated by the Youth Chamber of Sergach District)
  • Irina Mironova (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, nominated by the Association of Student Trade Union Organisations of Nizhny Novgorod Region)
  • Yury Miroshnichenko (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Konstantin Momotov (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 5, nominated by the Youth Chamber at the Zemstvo Assembly of Vyksa District)
  • Eduard Nebov (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 12, self-nominated)
  • Olga Nikishina (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the Association of Student Trade Union Organisations of Nizhny Novgorod Region)
  • Sergey Novikov (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 2, self-nominated)
  • Ilya Ogorodtsev (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation)
  • Mikhail Pelchenkov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Viktor Polikarpov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation")
  • Igor Sedykh (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation")
  • Mikhail Serbaev (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Evgeny Smolin (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 2, self-nominated)
  • Elena Starostina (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation")
  • Alexandra Steshova (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 4, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Boris Suzdaltsev (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Vyacheslav Tikhomirov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Evgeny Toropynin (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the Association of Student Trade Union Organisations of Nizhny Novgorod Region)
  • Dmitry Fedorov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Igor Fedoseev (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Dmitry Frolov (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, nominated by the Students' Trade Union Committee of the NGMA)
  • Ilya Khayretdinov (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Konstantin Chalenko (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, self-nominated)
  • Olga Chernova (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO "Association of Youth Parliaments of the Russian Federation")
  • Maria Shenogina (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, nominated by the Preschool Education Department of the Avtozavodsky District administration)
  • Arseny Shcheltsin (elected in the regional electoral district, nominated by the NRO VOO MGER)
  • Denis Shcherbukha (elected in single-mandate electoral district No. 6, self-nominated)
  • Alexander Yudkevich (elected in multi-mandate electoral district No. 1, self-nominated)

Interesting facts

  • The Youth Parliament has no web interface for working with young people whatsoever. Thus, its official site carries no contact details needed to send an appeal to the parliament, no list of deputies' constituency offices and the like.
  • Candidates for the Youth Parliament from various opposition parties took an active part in all the protests against Vainberg's fence, which blocked off the public embankment. As a result, they are credited (archive) with nothing less than an attempt to blow up the building of the Regional Legislative Assembly.

Those responsible for organising and holding the elections to the Youth Parliament

  • At the Electoral Commission of Nizhny Novgorod Region – Gagieva Marina Gennadyevna, tel. 439-16-50, +79519014725.
  • Technical support for holding the elections of Youth Parliament members – Orlov Mikhail Sergeevich, tel. +79519014729

Official site

See also