Penza, 30 November 2017. PenzaNews. The Left Front activist Marina Polubarova held a one-person rally in support of optimization of the city power structure near the central entrance to the Penza administration before the start of the 39th regular session on Thursday, November 30.

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She was holding the movement's flag and a poster with the inscription: "The Left Front demands that district administrations are optimized, the post of the city head is removed, direct elections of the mayor are returned".

During the protest, officials, deputies and ordinary citizens entered the building of the mayor's office from time to time. Some of them tried to pay no attention to the protester while the others, on the contrary, stopped and read carefully the written demands.

In particular, the acting head of the Penza City Duma, member of the United Russia faction Ivan Krasnov on seeing the poster quoted one of slogans of the Communist Party "Take and share".

"But as Bulgakov said, maybe you also know how to do so?" he said having slightly interpreted the doctor Bormental’s question from the novel "Hear of a Dog" aimed at Sharikov, which in the original goes as follows "And do you know the way?"

The press secretary of the regional Left Front department Sergei Padalkin, who was there, explained to a PenzaNews correspondent what was the essence of the rally in support of optimization of the city power structure.

With regard to the first requirement, he noted that under those circumstances it was unreasonable to have four district administrations in Penza as they were.

"They have no functions as such. We suggest [...] preserving the departments for improvement and communal services and eliminating all the others," the interlocutor said.

According to him, it was also necessary to rename the position of the city head the chairman of the Penza City Duma.

Sergei Padalkin thinks that many Penza residents simply do not understand what the difference between the city head and the head of the city administration is.

"By the same analogy [Valery] Lidin – chairman of the Legislative Assembly – may be called the region head, and [Vyacheslav] Volodin – chairman of the State Duma – may be called the head of Russia. That's absurd!" the opposition activist said.

As a primary requirement, he mentioned return to the system of direct elections of Penza mayor by analogy with the elections of President of Russia and governor of the Penza region.

"The mayor must be elected by people, only then they will be more responsible for their actions," the interlocutor stressed.

The one-person rally lasted exactly until 10.00 when the City Duma session started in a conference room.