Penza, 17 December 2013. PenzaNews. Former coordinator of the opposition movement “Left Front” of the Penza region Sergei Padalkin, whose military service term expires on the coming Thursday, December 19, is finishing it by removing snow. This was posted by the oppositionist on his Facebook page.

“In the army, I fired a machine gun, a grenade launcher, I threw grenades, drove an armored transport vehicle and an infantry combat vehicle. But I started serving with snow removal and I finish it the same way,” he wrote.

However, Sergei Padalkin expressed confidence that in the army he lost more than gained.

“Soldiers remove snow, do beds, and clean up. A year of service is too much,” the oppositionist added.

According to him, the Russian army reveals all the worst qualities of human nature.

“It does not make a man out of a boy. In most cases, it makes a criminal or a weak-willed cowardly milk-toast out of him,” Sergei Padalkin wrote.

He also remarked that the most difficult months of service are the first and the last.

“It is morally tough. You are constantly thinking of home, the wife, freedom,” the former coordinator of “Left Front” in the Penza region said.

According to Sergei Padalkin, along with the disadvantages of the military service, there are also some advantages.

“Military intelligence service in emergency conditions in the Republic of Tajikistan is a great tail-piece to the biography of an oppositionist,” he said.

As news agency PenzaNews reported earlier, at present, Sergei Padalkin is in Novosibirsk, where at the end of November he was sent from the 201st Russian military base in Tajikistan, which he was transferred to in May 2013 from Samara. Prior to that, he served in Yekaterinburg for four months.

Sergei Padalkin is expected to arrive in Penza by the end of the working week, and on the coming Sunday, he will take part in the regional report-and-election conference of “Left Front.”