Penza, 9 September 2014. PenzaNews. Zheleznodorozhny district court of Penza decided to cancel the registration of Oleg Shalyapin, the Communist Party candidate for the deputy of the City Duma of the sixth convocation from the single-mandate district No.1, reported Georgy Kamnev, deputy of the Legislative Assembly of the Penza region and the first secretary of the regional committee of the Communist Party, on Tuesday, September 9.

© PenzaNewsBuy the photo

According to him, the reason was Oleg Shalyapin’s participation in a karaoke night held in the district.

“One of the candidates provided the videos, where Oleg Shalyapin was shown present at a karaoke night. He did not sing, did not organize this event, but he was there and distributed his election campaign flyers. Actually, this video was presented in court as evidence that Oleg Shalyapin allegedly violated the copyright law. Our stance was that Oleg Shalyapin did not organize this event and did not use the money from his fund. But he knew that in the district where he is running, there will be a karaoke night with a lot of people and, naturally, he decided to take advantage of it — to be there and campaign for himself,” the agency interlocutor said.

According to the leader of Penza Communists, the court received no evidence that Oleg Shalyapin was the organizer of the event.

“He did not play any music or sing himself. We do not understand why the court decided that he is the organizer and the offender of some sort of rights. Moreover, as we learned, the organizer of the event had no violations — all CDs are licensed for public use,” Georgy Kamnev noted.

He added that he is looking forward to the full court decision.

“According to the law, the decision shall enter into force within 5 days, and today it is not in force yet — Oleg continues his struggle, and we continue our legal fight. We still have a chance to appeal to the court of cassation — the regional court — and we intend to use this right,” the first secretary of the regional committee of the Communist Party said.

Georgy Kamnev said that if the final solution of the Railway District Court of Penza will be received on Tuesday, September 9, the communists will be ready to appeal to the cassation court the very next day.

According to the Election Commission of Penza, seven candidates are registered in district No.1: Valery Belov (self-nominated), Evgeny Borovkov (self-nominated), Lyudmila Yeremina (“United Russia”), Sergey Novikov (self-nominated), Sergey Tsigvintsev (“Rodina”), Sergey Chistikin (LDPR) and Oleg Shalyapin (CPRF).