Navalny's main activities are aimed at combating corruption. Among the most high-profile investigations of FBK Navalny and his team are the case of Igor Chaika (son of Prosecutor General Yuri Chaika), Vladimir Yakunin’s “fur storage facility,” Dmitry Peskov’s watch, Vladimir Pekhtin’s real estate, Sergei Shoigu’s mansion, Igor Shuvalov’s plane and “tsar-apartment,” “secret Empire" by Dmitry Medvedev. Navalny also actively advocated for ratification in Russia of Article 20 of the UN Convention, which provides for punishment for the illegal enrichment of officials.
In 2013, Navalny was found guilty in the “Kirovles case”, but three years later the European Court of Human Rights recognized the case as politically fabricated and sent the verdict for review, but the court again returned a guilty verdict.
In December 2016, Navalny announced his intention to take part in the 2018 presidential elections.
Childhood. Education
Alexei Navalny was born in the military town of Butyn near Moscow. His father, Anatoly Navalny, a native of the Chernobyl region, graduated from the Kiev Military School, after which he was assigned to Moscow. Mom, Lyudmila Ivanovna, grew up in a village near Zelenograd, graduated from the State University of Education, worked as a laboratory assistant at a research institute that produced microelectronics, and later worked at a woodworking factory. 
In 1993, Navalny’s parents opened a wicker weaving workshop in the Odintsovo district of the Moscow region on the basis of a bankrupt factory, where Lyudmila Navalnaya had previously worked.
In 1994, the young man graduated from the Alabino school in the village of Kalininets near Moscow and entered the law faculty of the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia, missing one point for admission to Moscow State University. In 1999, he became a student at the Financial Academy under the Russian Government, studied at the Faculty of Finance and Credit, and in 2001 received a diploma in the specialty “Securities and Exchange Business”.
Much later, in 2010, he became a fellow of Yale University's Yale World Fellows program. Every year, the university selects about 15 gifted people, mostly from third world countries, and invites them to Yale for six months to study the global problems of our society.
Labor and business
While still studying at RUDN University, Navalny got a job as a lawyer at Aeroflot Bank. In 1997, he registered Allekt LLC, and in 1998 he began working for the ST-group of the Chigirinsky brothers (now Snegiri). He worked there for about a year, dealing with currency control and antimonopoly legislation. In 1999, two things happened - Navalny left ST-group and received a law degree.Social and political activities
In 2000, Alexei Navalny joined the Yabloko democratic party and was a member of the party’s Federal Political Council. Two years later, he was elected to the regional council of the capital branch of Yabloko. From 2004 to 2007, Navalny headed the apparatus of the Moscow regional branch of the party. 
In 2007, Navalny was expelled from Yabloko. The reason given was “causing political damage to the party, in particular, through nationalist activities.” As Navalny himself stated, the real reason for his expulsion is the demand for the resignation of Yabloko leader Grigory Yavlinsky.
In 2004, Navalny founded the “Committee for the Protection of Muscovites,” a citywide movement that opposes corruption in urban planning and the violation of citizens’ rights. A year later, Alexey, together with like-minded people, became the founders of a new youth movement called “YES!” He also began to coordinate the “Police with the People” project.
Since 2006, Navalny has coordinated the “Political Debates” project and acted as chief editor of the “Fight Club” program on TVC.
In 2007, he co-founded the national democratic movement “People” along with the writer Zakhar Prilepin and Sergei Gulyaev. It was planned that “People” would subsequently join the “Other Russia” coalition, but this did not happen.
Political debate between Navalny and Lebedev
In 2008, Navalny founded the Union of Minority Shareholders, an organization that defended the rights of private investors.
Navalny took part in the nationalist “Russian March” marches. In 2008, he witnessed the brutal detention of the leader of the “Slavic Union” Dmitry Demushkin by riot police, and was ready to defend him in court.
In 2008, information appeared about the creation of the “Russian National Movement”, which included the organizations “Great Russia”, “People”, and DPNI. Navalny stated that the movement plans to participate in the State Duma elections. But in 2011 the movement ceased activity.
Navalny's video in support of the People movement
In 2009, Navalny became a freelance adviser to the governor of the Kirov region, Nikita Belykh, who, as the site’s editors want to note, was arrested in the summer of 2016 on charges of taking a bribe.
Anti-corruption activities
In May 2008, Navalny announced on his blog that, together with like-minded people, he intended to find out why oil from large Russian state-owned companies was being sold by trader Gunvor. According to Alexey, he contacted the heads of Rosneft, Surgutneftegaz and Gazprom Neft, but received no clarification. By the way, Navalny is a minority shareholder of the companies “Surgutneftegaz”, “Rosneft”, “Gazpromneft”, “VTB”.At the end of 2010, Navalny announced the creation of the RosPil project, which intended to combat abuses in public procurement. By May 2011, the project reported on the discovery of fraud in state auctions amounting to 1.6 billion rubles, and with the help of RosPil participants, fraud amounting to 337 million rubles was stopped. The project received an award from the international blog competition The BOBs as the most useful resource for society.
In 2011, Navalny registered the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK). Economist Sergei Guriev and entrepreneurs Vladimir Ashurkov and Boris Zimin invested in the project.
“Party of crooks and thieves” - the author of this famous Internet meme is Alexei Navalny. The phrase was born on February 2, 2011 on the air of Finam FM. Soon information appeared that ordinary party members were offended and were planning to sue. In response to this, Navalny initiated a poll on his blog: “Is United Russia a party of swindlers and thieves?” 96.6% of the respondents, whose total number was 40 thousand, answered “yes”.
Navalny on Fimam FM
In mid-2011, Alexei Navalny launched the Internet project “RosYama” within the framework of FBK, which was supposed to encourage the Russian authorities to improve the condition of roads in the country. On the project pages, users posted pictures of damaged roads, on the basis of which the system generated complaints to the traffic police. If there was no response within the required time frame, RosYama employees sent a letter to the prosecutor’s office.
At the beginning of 2012, Navalny and his team launched the RosVybory project to monitor the presidential elections. About 17 thousand observers took part in the project.
Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation positions itself as the only non-profit organization in Russia that investigates acts of corruption among the highest echelons of power.
The FBK has repeatedly come under the radar of the head of Russian Railways, Vladimir Yakunin, to whom the Foundation attributed the presence of a “modest” dacha near Domodedovo with an area of several tens of hectares. Most of all, Internet users were struck by a separate room given over to a “fur storage room.”
A lot of noise was caused by Igor Shuvalov’s private plane discovered by Navalny, on which his Welsh Corgi dogs flew to exhibitions, as well as by the official’s purchase of apartments on one floor of an elite high-rise building on Kotelnicheskaya Embankment. FBK estimated the total cost of apartments in pre-renovation condition at 600 million rubles.
Navalny in the Moscow mayoral elections
Alexey Navalny nominated his candidacy for the post of mayor of Moscow in the early elections in 2013 from the RPR-Parnas party.And about. Mayor Sergei Sobyanin commented on Navalny’s actions as follows: “To be honest, I don’t know what prospects candidate Navalny has. We did everything possible to register him so that Muscovites would have the opportunity to have a greater choice among candidates for mayor of Moscow.”
Prosecutions. The Kirovles case
On December 5, 2011, that is, the day after the State Duma elections, Alexey Navalny spoke at an authorized rally on Chistoprudny Boulevard. Muscovites who came to the rally expressed disagreement with the election results and made accusations of fraud against the election commission and the United Russia party. 
After this action, Navalny and like-minded people went to an unauthorized march to the Russian Central Election Commission, where he was detained by the police. The next day, Navalny was found guilty of resisting law enforcement officers and sentenced to 15 days of administrative arrest. Navalny was released on December 21.
On May 9, 2012, Navalny was again sentenced to arrest for 15 days. This time – for participation in an illegal public event on Kudrinskaya Square, the so-called People’s festivities,” which became a mass sign of protest against the dispersal of the “March of Millions” that took place earlier, on May 6. The march participants were unhappy with the fact of Vladimir Putin's inauguration. Navalny appealed this detention and arrest to the European Court of Human Rights.
In May 2011, a criminal case was opened against Alexei Navalny under Art. 165 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation – “causing property damage by deception or abuse of trust.” The point was that Navalny and businessman Pyotr Ofitserov, the owner of the Vyatka Forestry Company, allegedly misled the director of the State Unitary Enterprise Kirovles, Vyacheslav Opalev, as a result of which he signed a contract unfavorable for his enterprise and suffered damage of 16 million rubles.
Navalny denied guilt, citing bias in the case, since shortly before this he had presented information on cuttings at Transneft on his blog, and also accused Opalev of “creating completely unthinkable schemes” for the sale of timber. According to Navalny, he achieved the dismissal of Opalev and a full audit of Kirovles, which was the reason for initiating the case.
Navalny: “The truth about Russia, power and Putin”, 2011
After proceedings, the case was dismissed on April 10, 2012. The reason is the lack of evidence of a crime. It was later resumed by order of the leaders of the Investigative Committee. However, on May 29 of the same year, the order to terminate the case was canceled.
The case came back to court in April 2013. The testimony of prosecution witnesses indicated that the cooperation of Kirovles with VLK was unprofitable for the former. However, VLK’s partners testified that the timber was shipped to them at market prices, and they have no complaints against both defendants in the case. The governor of the Kirov region, Belykh, who spoke at the trial, also stated that the activities of VLK did not harm the region.
On July 18, 2013, Navalny was sentenced to five years in prison and a fine (500 thousand rubles), Ofitserov was sentenced to four years in prison and a similar fine. The sentence was carried out during Navalny's election campaign for the mayoral elections.
During the appeal hearing that took place the next day, Navalny and Ofitserov were released on their own recognizance. During further consideration, violations were discovered when making a guilty decision, and the real terms were replaced with suspended sentences while maintaining the fine. Alexey Navalny appealed to the ECHR, which in February 2016 confirmed the violation of the rights of the accused in the Kirovles case, but did not recognize the case as politically motivated, as Navalny and Ofitserov’s lawyers insisted.
The Kirovles case: Navalny’s last word
At the end of 2016, the court again began considering the Kirovles case. The new sentence, according to Navalny, repeated the previous one verbatim. The defendants were again sentenced to 4 and 5 years probation. On the same day, the ECHR condemned the verdict, calling the goal of the entire process to exclude Navalny from the country’s political process.
Alexey Navalny 2018
In December 2016, Navalny announced that he intended to take part in the 2018 presidential elections, thereby launching his election campaign, during which he, together with like-minded people, opened a number of election headquarters in the largest cities of Russia.Alexei Navalny aims to run for president
In March 2017, the Foundation posted on YouTube a 50-minute film “He’s Not Dimon to You,” which was an investigation into a “multi-level corruption scheme” with the participation of Dmitry Medvedev. Three weeks later, rallies of thousands took place across Russia, with participants demanding answers from Medvedev about the information contained in the video.
“He’s not your Dimon”
On March 26, during an unauthorized rally on Tverskaya Street, Alexei Navalny was detained by law enforcement agencies. He was issued a fine (20 thousand rubles) for organizing an unauthorized rally, and was also sentenced to 15 days of administrative arrest for “resisting a lawful demand of a police officer.”
On June 12, Russia was swept by a second wave of opposition rallies. This time, Alexey did not have time to leave the entrance when he was detained by the police. The Simonovsky District Court of Moscow arrested him for 30 days, accusing him of multiple violations of the rules for holding rallies: on the evening of June 11, he called on supporters to go to an unauthorized procession on Tverskaya Street, where a festival of re-enactors was taking place at that time, instead of the agreed rally on Sakharov Avenue. In total, more than 800 people were detained during the opposition rally in Moscow.
As part of the election campaign, the politician held a number of large-scale rallies in Russian cities.
The Central Electoral Commission refused to register Navalny for the presidential election due to his criminal record in the Kirovles case, despite the decision of the ECHR recognizing him as politically engaged. After this, Alexey called for a boycott of the elections and named the date of the all-Russian voter strike - January 28.
How Mikhail Prokhorov bought a villa from Alexander Khloponin
For the rally against the inauguration of Vladimir Putin “He is not your king” (held on May 5, 2018), ten days later, Navalny was arrested for 30 days. The election campaign ended, and FBK returned to its main activities: it caught Mikhail Prokhorov in bribing Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Khloponin, found a Parisian apartment from propagandist Aram Gabrelyanov for 2 million euros, etc.
Personal life of Alexei Navalny
Alexei Navalny is married. The oppositionist's wife's name is Yulia, her maiden name is Abrosimova. They met in 1999 at a resort in Turkey. The couple has two children: daughter Daria (born in 2001) and son Zakhar (born in 2008). 
For a long time, the couple lived in a small apartment in one of the panel houses on Lyublinskaya Street, Maryino. However, at the end of 2016, the oppositionist announced that he was looking for housing to rent, as his grown-up children began to feel cramped living in one room.
Alexey Navalny now
In August 2018, FBK published a video investigation involving State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin and his 82-year-old mother Lidiya Barabanova, a former school teacher. The oppositionist cited evidence that the woman owned an apartment worth more than 200 million rubles, as well as several businesses, one of which was registered quite recently. Navalny’s team argued that Barabanova was a front person for registering companies, and that their true owner was her son. The video caused a wide resonance, given that a few days earlier Volodin publicly predicted the complete abolition of pensions in the absence of pension reforms and advised the people gathered in the hall to play more sports in order to live up to retirement age.FBK: Apartment and business of Vyacheslav Volodin’s mother
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Alexey Navalny is a well-known Russian public and political figure leading a public fight against corruption. He is considered a symbol of the Russian non-systemic opposition. He is the author of the highest-rated political blog on LiveJournal and the head of the RosPil project, aimed at combating abuses in public procurement. The biography of Alexei Navalny is full of scandals and criminal cases in which he was the main defendant in major thefts and fraud. The attitude of the population towards the activist and oppositionist Navalny is ambiguous - some consider him a brilliant fighter for truth and justice, others, on the contrary, see him as an ordinary populist who, with his expressed attitude against government agencies and political parties, is trying to deceive the people.
early years
Navalny Alexey Anatolyevich was born on June 4, 1976 in the military town of Butyn, located in the Moscow region. His parents, Anatoly Ivanovich and Lyudmila Ivanovna, were ordinary people who, at the time of democratic changes, managed to become businessmen, owners of the Kobyakovsky wicker weaving factory. According to Alexey himself, his ancestry is closely connected with Ukraine, since it was in this country that a significant part of his relatives lived. In the future, voters and users of social networks will more than once ask Alexey Anatolyevich about his position on Ukraine, asking for his opinion on the events that occurred in the neighboring state at the end of 2013 - beginning of 2014. In his blog on LiveJournal, Navalny will present in detail his own conclusions and vision changes in Kyiv.
The future non-system oppositionist spent his school years in the military village of Kalininets, where he graduated from high school in 1993, after which he moved to the Russian capital. In Moscow, Navalny immediately entered the Peoples' Friendship University at the Faculty of Law. In 1998, having received a law degree, the young lawyer decided to expand his professional base, and to accomplish this task he became a student at the Financial Academy under the Government of the Russian Federation. Simultaneously with his studies in finance and credit, Alexey worked as a lawyer at Aeroflot Bank and the development company ST Group.
Having received a diploma in financier, Navalny did not stop there and completed a 6-month course of study at Yale University under the Yale World Fellows grant program, where he managed to get on the recommendations of Sergei Guriev and Evgenia Albats, “venerable” Russian oppositionists, whose opinion was then very much listened in America.
Career and business
Alexei Navalny’s working career started back in his student years, but was exclusively business-oriented. Over the course of several years, he became the founder of a dozen enterprises with “zero” income, which he sold very successfully after a short period of activity. This fact already interested critics who suspected the future oppositionist of fraud and organizing fraud.
In 2008, Alexei Navalny began to become interested in “investment activism” and began buying small stakes in the companies Transneft, Surgutneft, Gazpromneft, Rosneft, VTB and Sberbank. Having become a full shareholder, he began to demand the publication of information about the activities of the management of these structures, on which the income of shareholders depended. Then he called the Gazprom company his main opponent and was even able to get a criminal case initiated against one of the managers of a large corporation.
Along with the business, the income from which allowed the young lawyer to live comfortably, Navalny was actively involved in political activities.
Policy
His start in politics was the democratic party "Yabloko", in which he held leading positions until 2007, thanks to the support of his associates, and.
After being expelled from Yabloko, Navalny co-founded the national democratic movement “People” and became an active participant in the radical “Russian March” march.
In 2009, Alexey Navalny was elected as a freelance adviser to the governor of the Kirov region, Nikita Belykh, and headed the non-profit organization “Initiative Support Fund” of the head of the Kirov regional state administration.
Alexey Navalny often criticizes not only current officials, but also those who were already in leading positions in the public administration system. In particular, television viewers remembered the discussion between the oppositionist and the reformer of the 90s on the “Direct Conversation” program, hosted by. In the studio of the Dozhd TV channel, questions were raised not only about the activities of the state corporation Rusnano, whose general director is Chubais, but also in general the problems of financing this company and Russian science were discussed.
Gradually, Alexey Anatolyevich becomes one of the leaders of the opposition in Russia, and after the murder, it was Navalny who was considered the main critic of the authorities within the country. Navalny himself blames the Russian top leadership for the murder of his political ally and friend. According to him, there was a “terrorist attack that did not achieve its goal.”
Moscow mayoral elections
Soon his plans included the goal of becoming the mayor of Moscow, and in 2013 he was registered with the Moscow City Election Commission as a candidate, but he failed to win the elections - Alexei Navalny received 27% of the votes, which did not give him the right to take the high post of the capital's mayor.
The election results, of course, did not satisfy the headquarters of the non-systemic oppositionist, and the very next day after their announcement he organized a rally in Moscow on Chistoprudny Boulevard in order to demonstrate disagreement with the announced voting results. After the rally, he led an unauthorized march to the Central Election Commission of Russia, during which he was detained by police and received 15 days of administrative arrest.
At that time, he had already created his own anti-corruption Internet projects “RosPil”, “RosYama” and “RosVybory”, and also registered the “Anti-Corruption Foundation”, which, in his opinion, should have created the image of an uncompromising anti-corruption official and made him a positive hero in the eyes of the population. But Navalny was unable to achieve this status for a long time, as many criminal cases involving his participation began to come to light.
Arrest and criminal cases
The criminal prosecution of Alexei Navalny started in 2011, when he was convicted of crime, namely causing property damage by deception. Based on the results of the investigation, the well-known non-system oppositionist was sentenced to 5 years in prison in 2013, but the day after the verdict, Alexey Anatolyevich was released on his own recognizance. Then both Russians and international society condemned Navalny’s sentence, considering it politically motivated. Even the Russian president expressed his attitude towards the verdict, calling it “strange.” After reviewing the case, the court changed the punishment and changed it to a suspended sentence.
Navalny’s second high-profile criminal case was the trial of the Yves Rocher company, in which he, along with his brother Oleg, was accused of large-scale theft and money laundering of a French company. As a result, the court sentenced Alexey Anatolyevich to 3.5 years probation, and his brother received a real sentence of the same amount. The brothers-accomplices were also fined 4.8 million rubles.
The Kirovles case is another high-profile criminal proceeding against Navalny. The consideration of the case on the facts of possible damage to the Kirov state enterprise “Kirovles” will drag on for years.
Despite this, Navalny remains a leader for many Russians, especially Muscovites. Many consider the figure to be a people's political leader, and his activities are called useful for Russian society and the economy. In 2012, according to Time magazine, he became the only Russian to be included in the TOP 100 most influential people in the world.
Navalny Foundation
In 2011, Alexey Navalny created the non-profit organization “Fund for Fighting Corruption”, which would later become a very large-scale structure in Russia. The new structural formation unites all of Navalny’s projects, and the public figure himself refuses various kinds of anonymous donations.
The founders of the new fund were able to gain enormous experience in public and transparent fundraising by organizing financing for the RosPil project. Using the Yandex.Money payment system, the fund attracts a significant amount of funds to ensure normal functioning. In addition, professional lawyers and economists are also actively involved in the work of the organization, who carefully try to identify illegal schemes in the public procurement system.
The management of the fund has taken a detailed approach to developing a strategy for its actions in various areas, and the main task of the structure is to organize local situations in which the state apparatus will feel pressure from the public. According to the creators, such a unit can become a real alternative to the current public administration system. The founders of the foundation themselves have repeatedly argued that the activities of such a structure cannot be considered an attack on the Russian state itself, because participants in the process of forming a system of power are interested in the stability and durability of all branches of the state apparatus, and total pressure on officials will contribute to positive internal transformations throughout the country.
Alexey Navalny in the office of the Anti-Corruption Foundation The issue of financing the fund has always been of interest not only to government officials, but also to other prominent public figures, as well as ordinary citizens. According to the leaders of the organization, a transparent system for raising funds was created, within which it was possible to use $300 thousand for the annual budget. Navalny himself has repeatedly argued that initially the fund needed mass support, because it is the receipt of funds from completely different categories of citizens that allows us to confirm the honesty and openness of the organization.
It was the financing of the structure that interested ordinary Russians the most. Who is behind him? Soon, many Russian voters began asking a similar question, trying to find out more about Navalny's activities. In Russia itself, representatives of some political forces openly call Alexey an “American spy,” and the foundation is accused of attracting funds from abroad.
The Investigative Committee conducted a search at the office of the Anti-Corruption Foundation The foundation will soon present several investigative films. One of the first films that caused a public outcry in Russia was the investigative documentary film “The Seagull.” The filmmakers presented a new investigation into the business and criminal connections of the sons of the Russian Prosecutor General. Other anti-corruption revelations followed.
Navalny himself also fueled interest in the fund’s activities with his publications on the microblogging service Twitter. In particular, one of the posts that the asset manager of the Deputy Prime Minister purchased an entire floor in one of the elite high-rise buildings caused a storm of indignation among members of the public. The oppositionist demanded an investigation into this matter.
Alexey Navalny now
In March 2017, unauthorized rallies took place in many regions of the Russian Federation. Thousands of citizens who gathered in the squares of the country's major cities demanded an investigation into corruption in the highest echelons of power.
The reason for mass protests was a film by the Navalny Foundation about the property of the Russian Prime Minister. Many Russians were clearly shocked by the information provided by the investigation, which revealed that one of the country's top officials is the owner of a “secret empire” that was created through complex corruption schemes. According to Navalny, Medvedev allegedly manages huge funds and assets, and the official’s inner circle controls the flow of funds into the accounts of organizations. It is assumed that tens of billions of rubles were consistently transferred to the accounts of such structures. Such incriminating evidence excited the Russian public.
Some deputies also supported the citizens' indignation. In particular, representatives of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation demanded the creation of an investigative commission that could conduct a transparent investigation and also check all materials.
Navalny commented on his desire to participate in the elections with the desire of people who, he believes, are already massively supporting his anti-corruption program. According to the opposition figure, he is obliged to participate in the elections because he carries political representation for these people.
Navalny’s political career was not without incidents. On March 19, 2017, at one of the protests, which was organized against an increase in tariffs for housing and communal services, the politician was pelted with eggs in Novosibirsk. Still, this did not stop the oppositionist from meeting people and listening to their problems.
Personal life
The personal life of Alexei Navalny is not particularly remarkable against the backdrop of his scandalous career. In 1999, while on vacation in Turkey, he met his future wife Julia, a holiday romance with whom ended in marriage. For 15 years now, she has been creating a reliable home base for him and putting up with all the “side effects” of her husband’s political activities.
Navalny's friends and associates believe that he has a strong and wonderful family, in which they are raising two children - Daria and Zakhar. The spouses themselves say that at home there is a complete delineation of spheres of influence: Julia supports her husband’s political views, but does not give advice on work, and he does not interfere in the household and raising children.
Navalny’s family lives in the Maryino district of Moscow region in an ordinary panel house in an “economy class” apartment with an area of about 80 square meters. Also, the Russian oppositionist owns Hyundai and VAZ-21083 cars, and his wife owns a Ford car. According to official data, Navalny’s income in 2012 amounted to 9 million rubles, which became known during his election campaign for the post of mayor of Moscow.
A remarkable fact is that Alexei Navalny’s height is 189 centimeters. This allows us to classify the political and public figure as one of the highest representatives of Russian politics.
How to deliberately and quickly drive away voters
Political technology is not an absolute craft. And it depends on the context and discourse. You cannot use American technology in Russia, and Russian technology is useless in America. And every person who has ever tried to apply something in his political practice knows this from his own experience.
And what does this experience tell us? This experience tells us that Russian voters do not like ostentatious wealth. A textbook example here is the election video of the SPS party, filmed in 2003. Boris Nemtsov, Anatoly Chubais and Irina Khakamada are flying in a business jet, sitting in white leather chairs and discussing the fate of Russia. Just one video led to disaster: the party's technologists quarreled, the headquarters collapsed, the party lost the elections and was never able to recover. Every Russian political strategist remembers this story and will tell it to you if you wake him up at night and ask him what not to do in the elections.
The second postulate, known to every Russian technologist, says: there is a right-wing liberal electorate, but it does not decide the elections. Therefore, any Russian right-wing liberal party always ended any of its campaigns with the pension issue - that is, with an approach to the electorate of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation. And after flying on a business jet in white leather seats, you won’t go to the electorate of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation. They won't understand you.
Now, armed with this basic knowledge, let's look at Alexei Navalny. The man who, according to him, is going to become president. The other day, observers interested in the campaign could see how Navalny’s chief of staff Leonid Volkov opened a headquarters in Sochi via Skype and... from Cyprus. Where he, according to him, was “on FBK business.” The next day, observers learned that Alexei Navalny himself and his wife flew to Paris. On the weekend. And although Mr. Volkov said that these were slander and that candidate Navalny was in Moscow and was working with documents, the ubiquitous Life provided the public with video recordings of both the departure and arrival of the tribune.
When a man takes his woman to Paris for a weekend, this evokes every approval from me as a man. I respect Navalny for taking his wife to a romantic place.
But in the current context and discourse, Alexey Navalny is not just a man. He is a presidential candidate, although unofficial, but named. Can a presidential candidate in a country whose population has lost 20 percent of its real income over the past 30 months take his wife to Paris for the weekend? Let us remember about the SPS business jet and about the electorate that we will ultimately have to reach. And who has never been to Paris at all.
It’s me, mind you, who hasn’t asked anything about money yet. But we do not know about any declared sources of income for the Navalny family, except for the Anti-Corruption Fund. And everything looks exactly as you thought - that Volkov went to Cyprus, and Navalny went to Paris with FBK money. The other day Navalny reported to all of us about the effective use of them. And in front of me too - after all, I once donated 500 rubles to him. Just to later wonder where they spent it. Now I know where they were spent - on Paris. No, as a man, I am not at all against the fact that Navalny used my 500 rubles to take his wife to drink champagne and eat oysters. But why then tell us about some other people’s corruption? After all, this is who she is.
However, let's move on to the most interesting part. Mr. Navalny’s wife, the beautiful Yulia, is not at all sitting in the kitchen waiting for her husband to take her to Paris for the day. No, she also travels. And a few days before Paris, she took her children... to the United States of America. Where they will learn English in a children's language camp.
Well, it is necessary to study English, and every parent decides for themselves where their children will do this. But what does this look like from the perspective of a potential voter? Here's how: a Russian presidential candidate takes his children to study in the United States at a time when the United States is introducing harsh and unfair sanctions against Russia. Of course, I understand that the trip was planned long before any sanctions. But if it had been canceled due to sanctions, it would have greatly increased Navalny’s voter base. Why wasn't this done? I'll explain it to you below.
Navalny told us many times about unscrupulous Russian officials whose children study abroad. He told us about their crazy, ostentatious spending. And he promised that when he comes to power, everything will be different.
But personally, I cannot afford to take my wife to Paris for the weekend. It's expensive for me. Although I work very hard. And when Navalny manages to arouse my sincere anger towards officials who send their children abroad, I immediately see that he himself sends his children abroad. So what is the difference, Alexey? Why should I vote for you if you are no different from those you are against?
And now, as I promised, I will explain. Of course, Navalny and Volkov are not fools, and everyone understands this as well as I do. They just... are not going to participate in the elections. They understand that they will not be registered. They understand that even if they are registered, they still won’t win, because it’s simply impossible. And if this is so, then there is no point in flirting with a large electorate. You just need to continue to deceive your small, nuclear electorate, adherents who can’t even grow grass - they will still continue to believe in the divine essence of the tribune. And they will continue to give money. Which, in fact, is what is required of them.
Therefore, headquarters will, of course, continue to open. And people will continue to bring money. And then the Central Election Commission will finally refuse registration and you can only throw up your hands: alas, we tried...
And then the volunteers will shrug their shoulders and go their separate ways. And millions will remain.
On September 1, 2017, the daughter of FBK founder Alexei Navalny, Daria, went to tenth grade. There is, of course, nothing remarkable about this for all those outside the oppositionist’s family circle. Just like in a simple amateur photos, which captured this event, which Navalny posted on Instagram. Although... if you take a closer look, you can find something strange and very interesting, writes Life.
So what is it? Any little thing that you can't see with the naked eye? Not at all: attention should be concentrated on the facade of the building, in front of which the memorable event was recorded either for history or for a family album. So what is this interesting building? Some secret private school for superhumans? To some extent, yes: this is the elite 45th gymnasium named after L. I. Milgram.
It’s easy to verify that it’s her by comparing this photo with other photos posted by students of this institution, with one of whom the politician even took a photo ( photo 1 , photo 2 , photo 3).
And what is so special about it? - you ask. And the fact that the gymnasium has an advanced preparation program for entering Western universities under the International Baccalaureate program. The Diploma Program (IB Diploma Program) is “a unique pre-university course for high school students, which gives the opportunity at the end of their studies to receive an officially recognized diploma, which provides the right to continue their education at the best universities in the world.” Moreover, in countries such as the USA, Canada, Ireland, Great Britain, Belgium, France, Norway, Sweden, Australia, applicants with an IB diploma are admitted to universities without entrance exams; only the passing grade and requirements for grades in the diploma in a certain set of subjects are stipulated .
It is clear that studying under such a program is unlikely to be free. Will not be. Its cost, according to Life sources in the Moscow Department of Education, for the 2017/2018 academic year is 700 thousand rubles. As a source close to Navalny confirmed to Life, his daughter Daria is “gnawing the granite of science” at such a paid preparatory department.
From here, a simple conclusion is drawn that the FBK leader plans to give his daughter a higher education abroad. And at some prestigious university. Which, in the context of his fierce criticism of senior officials doing the same thing, looks strange, to put it mildly. But from the father’s point of view, it is completely natural: who wouldn’t want to give their child a good education? Moreover, Navalny is not yet an official. So bribes are fine.
Perhaps this is just a backup option in case Russia becomes completely unbearable for the oppositionist. Let us remember that both Herzen and Lenin did not disdain emigration, in which, we emphasize, they lived comfortably. So why is Navalny worse? Moreover, it is clear that he is not trying for himself. But, nevertheless, this “business” should be approached with all attention regarding its financial component: education abroad is not a cheap pleasure, even if the study is free. And not everyone can afford to shell out 700 thousand rubles for the year of the 45th gymnasium. More precisely, the vast majority.
Photo "Kont"
In which he and his wife Yulia Navalnaya see off their daughter Daria to the tenth grade. Meanwhile, on social networks, including in various accounts on Instagram, students of the 45th gymnasium named after L.I. Milgram, on the same day photographs were published showing Alexey Navalny himself. Here, for example, a user with the nickname vladeroshenko publishes a photo with the founder of FBK on September 1, on which the geotag is clearly visible - and this is the same elite 45th gymnasium.
In addition, on social networks there are photographs of students against the background of the same facade, in front of which Alexei Navalny was photographed with his wife and daughter, and the geolocation of the published photos gives a specific address in Moscow - Grimau Street, 8, where the 45th gymnasium named after L.I. is located . Milgram. You can compare facade decorative elements in photographs of other users, for example, and.
It should be noted that the gymnasium has an advanced preparation program for entering Western universities under the International Baccalaureate program. The Diploma Program (IB Diploma Program) is “a unique pre-university course for high school students, which gives the opportunity at the end of their studies to receive an officially recognized diploma, granting the right to continue their education at the best universities in the world.”
As stated on the gymnasium’s website, the International Baccalaureate diploma is recognized in more than 100 countries around the world. In the USA, Canada, Ireland, Great Britain, Belgium, France, Norway, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand and some other countries, applicants with an IB diploma are admitted to universities without entrance exams; only the passing grade and requirements for grades in the diploma in a certain set of subjects are stipulated .
However, the provision of this educational service is paid. According to the regulations on the admission of students to the 10th grade of the State Budgetary Educational Institution "Gymnasium No. 45" of the Moscow Department of Education to study in the International Baccalaureate Diploma Program (IB Diploma Programme) for the 2014/2015 academic year, the total cost of the full (two-year) course of the diploma program is 500,000 rubles; At the same time, according to Life’s sources in the Moscow Department of Education, for the 2017/2018 academic year the price has currently increased and amounts to 700 thousand rubles. As a source close to Navalny confirmed to Life, his daughter Daria is studying at the paid preparatory department of the International Baccalaureate.
Navalny himself has repeatedly spoken extremely negatively about the facts of the children of famous politicians studying abroad. So, in particular, speaking about the children of former State Duma Deputy Speaker Zheleznyak, Navalny wrote in his blog:
There was allegedly some kind of rumor, and so many sources confirmed that all officials, including employees of state corporations, were about to be forced to recall their offspring from studying abroad and transfer them all to Russian schools and universities. I didn’t even begin to speak out on the topic because there was no point in commenting on anything. The “I steal, I earn here, I spend there” scheme has become so ingrained in the value system of the modern official that no decrees can eradicate it. This is the true United Russia spiritual bond.
And here’s how the founder of FBK and “presidential candidate” commented on the situation with the children of the former head of Russian Railways, Vladimir Yakunin:
Victor and Darina have an eight-year-old daughter, Vladimir Ivanovich’s granddaughter, Polina Yakunina. Polina, like her cousin Igor, seems to also limit herself to only a couple of paragraphs about Russian history, because she studies at a prestigious Swiss school, where they educate the very “Western elite” who dream of destroying Russia, soullessly tearing it apart.
As Life previously wrote, Alexey Navalny sent his two children to a summer educational camp in the United States, where they spent about a month, and the founder of FBK himself noted in comments on social networks that he sees nothing wrong with foreign education for his children.