Divide et impera? Who is behind the new communists in Russia

Russia might soon have another major communists party. The leaders of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation are weighing who is interested in an alternative movement.

The leadership of the newly created all- Russia public organization, “Communists of Russia”, which has set an ambitious goal of becoming a political party, claim that they are drastically different from the established party – the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF).

”The leadership of the CPRF turned this formerly influential party into an obedient servant of the Kremlin administration, which is allowed to criticize some ministers in doses,” said the organization statement. “The role of the CPRF in the current political system is to imitate opposition which criticizes the government and to accumulate left opposition voices.”

According to the leaders of the “Communists of Russia,” CPRF members of parliament are quite happy with the current state of things as well as the deputy privileges they have such as personal cars and state financing of those parties represented in parliament.

Leadership for the “Communists of Russia,” in turn, said that they have a “comprehensive position on how to protect workers’ rights” and to gather many left wing organization and movements with a goal to become a political party. They expressed their devotion to the ideas of scientific communism and building socialist and communist societies.

In his interview with Russia’s Nezavisimaya Gazeta CPRF’s Sergey Obukhov, however, claimed that the creation of the Communists of Russia is orchestrated from the Kremlin, worried by rising ratings of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation.

Still, one of CPRF’s leaders, Ivan Melnikov, later announced that the “initiative hardly comes from the Kremlin.” Instead, he pointed at the Just Russia Party, which is trying to play on the same field with communists.