Penza, 16 December 2015. PenzaNews. Georgy Kamnev, first secretary of the CPRF regional committee, deputy of the Penza region Legislative Assembly, says he holds nothing against Victor Kuvaytsev being elected the new head of Penza city administration during the 16th extraordinary City Duma session held on Wednesday, December 16.

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“I see nothing bad here. Overall, we consider him a good candidate. Of course, we cannot call the current situation a good one – it is very tough for the city and the region,” the leader of Penza Communists told PenzaNews agency.

Describing the new mayor, Georgy Kamnev called him “a considerate man, who makes each decision carefully and without haste.”

“I greatly hope that, unlike Chernov [Penza mayor between December 2005 and 19 June 2014], Victor Nikolaevich [Kuvaytsev] will allot more time to talk to Penza citizens. Chernov had this issue: he was unavailable for citizens – regular people living in Penza. And, unlike Krivov [Penza mayor between 18 July 2014 and 18 November 2015], I hope he will choose a more balanced and thoughtful staff policy. Krivov’s main issue was exactly in the staff policy, when people with neither professional skills nor required personal qualities were getting appointed to important and vital positions. I hope Victor Nikolaevich will not have such disadvantages,” he said.

In his opinion, the new city administration head will have to quickly resolve several important city issues created during his predecessors’ rule.

“The largest issue is that financial groups have wrestled control over the main fields in the city’s life – transportation and communal services. We greatly expect that Victor Nikolaevich will not be afraid of these groups. […] We published many pieces on this issue, and spoke about it – I will not wander into details. The main principle goes like that: business owners get the profits, city budget gets the losses. They have a very simple strategy, these financial groups. This nefarious scheme must be broken. We greatly hope that Victor Nikolaevich will begin this fight – fight for the budget, for the people, against these financial groups. Of course, if this does happen, we are ready to provide support. I hope Victor Nikolaevich shows more active participation, including with political parties, with various civil organizations. We have a thing or two to offer,” Georgy Kamnev added.

He also commented on newspieces on certain news websites with harsh criticism addressed to the Communist Party members over them not promoting their own candidate, and told PenzaNews the reasoning behind the lack of any promotion.

“First of all, certain news websites say we did something wrong after any action the CPRF regional committee takes. Like that: we do something – that’s wrong, we don’t do anything – also bad. As I see it, certain news websites have that as an objective. Overall, it seems some writers for certain news websites are omniscient – they know who needs to what and how to do this or that. I’d like to ask them: why haven’t they promoted someone of their own? Secondly, the previous United Russia representative, the city head [Roman Chernov] who spent a long time in the office, saw many issues appearing during his rule – in transportation, in communal field; the large debt, like Kuvaytsev pointed out, is also one of the issues. I think the United Russia needs to resolve the issue on its own as it was their representative who created them,” Georgy Kamnev explained.

“And one more point – the most important reason why we did not promote anyone: the city head on his own can do nothing to change the situation significantly. Basically, he is a servant to the overall social and economic policy. And if the economy goes down, he can be good or bad, but he would be unable to significantly change the situation at all,” he clarified.

At the same time, Georgy Kamnev pointed out that the Communists support the idea of people’s mayor elections.

“We support the people’s elections of the Penza city administration head, especially in the light of the tough situation our country and our region face. A people’s mandate of trust would reinforce the authority and provide grounds for reforms. The population are not taking part in mayor elections, so their trust overall is less than if they would elect him themselves,” the leader of Penza Communists summed up.