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Putin's Russia: Icy Siberia reveals cracks in society
One man flea market. Preparing for the new day in Irkutsk, Russia.
Increasing poverty. And yet Moscow subsidizes occupied Crimea with $2 Billion a year.
And Putin's war in east Ukraine rolls on, costing Russia ~$4 million a day for salaries, graft, ammunition, fuel, feeding the populace, etc.
One man flea market. Preparing for the new day in Irkutsk, Russia.
12/29/18
It takes hours for the morning steam to lift from the river in Irkutsk and for the temperature to creep up from around -20C. This sprawling Siberian city feels like a place apart, its harsh realities overlooked by the decision-makers in Moscow, five time zones to the west. Those realities are symbolized by an outside loo. The "toilet of shame" stands outside an apartment block in one of Irkutsk's most depressed suburbs. The wooden shack was installed in the frozen yard by the building's management firm when residents' debts reached record levels. It's a warning of where they'll have to come, if they don't pay up. "We tell people that we'll block the sewage pipes in their flats if they don't pay," the firm's boss Alexei Mikhailov explains beside the hut, his breath falling in frozen clouds. He's been doing just that, at a rate of 40 toilets a month. "Our wages aren't going up, but prices for everything are rising," says Natalia, one of the residents who owes Alexei money. "I've heard they're blocking toilets. But that will just make people angrier." Another woman who admits she has no way to repay her debt says her own loo has been blocked for months. She has been forced to use bags. Officially, 13% of Russians are now living in poverty, a figure that has been climbing for five years. A recent survey by the well-connected Ranepa institute suggested the true statistic was 22%.
In Irkutsk, even officially, it's 20%. President Vladimir Putin has pledged to halve those figures by 2024, but the economy is barely growing while the grumbles of discontent clearly are. Rising fuel and communal service prices top the complaints list. Sales tax (VAT) will hit 20% in the New Year; then there's pension reform. Vyacheslav Golovin has been driving the number 65 bus in Irkutsk for two decades, a route that now runs past the outside toilet. At 56, he had begun to look forward to his pension: not to retire and rest, but for extra cash. His salary some months is just 15,000 roubles (£200). "Our leaders don't listen," Vyacheslav complains, opening the doors of his bus for passengers to clamber in from the cold. "They didn't even let us hold a referendum." "It's getting harder to get by. Groceries cost more; utilities; electricity. It's all going up," the bus driver says, perched on a sofa-bed in his one-room flat. "It's not like Europe, here. Pensioners can't relax. They have to keep working to survive." In Irkutsk some of his harshest critics are the Young Communists. "We really don't like our government," 21-year-old Evgeny puts it bluntly. "We have to change our president with his friends." There is no revolution brewing in Irkutsk, whatever the Communist Youth might like. Even protests, so far, have been relatively small. Vladimir Putin's talk of Great Russia did chime with a nation that felt strong and stable after the trauma of the post-Soviet years. But here, in the freezing heart of Siberia, it seems the cracks in that message are starting to show.
Increasing poverty. And yet Moscow subsidizes occupied Crimea with $2 Billion a year.
And Putin's war in east Ukraine rolls on, costing Russia ~$4 million a day for salaries, graft, ammunition, fuel, feeding the populace, etc.
