The Arrest of Sergei Furgal as a Kremlin Power Grab

Regional governors are key players in the power struggle between Moscow and its 83 federal subjects. Ensuring the election of Kremlin-loyal governors has historically circumvented these tensions and mitigated the risks of political fallout and public unrest. When two candidates managed to unseat governors from Putin’s United Russia party in 2018, the seeds were sown for today’s power plays and popular protests.

One of those opposition governors is Sergei Furgal of the far-right Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR), who won a landslide 70 percent victory against incumbent governor Vyacheslav Shport in Khabarovsk Krai in far eastern Russia. His election demonstrates how new political forces are threatening the Kremlin’s influence beyond Moscow. By channeling voters’ frustration and securing the backing of strong political machines, opposition candidates can pull off surprising victories. However, those victories may incur harsh retribution. Two years of controversy surrounding his election came to a head on July 9, 2020 when Furgal was arrested on suspicion of orchestrating the murders of two businessmen fifteen years prior. 

As early as 2019, political analysts declared Furgal “an undesirable candidate for the Kremlin.” While Russian media giant RIA Novosti reported that his arrest was part of a larger investigation into an organized criminal group, political analyst Nikolai Petrov argued that the fact that the crimes were allegedly committed fifteen years ago indicates that the arrest itself is “an act of political repression.” Aleksei Vorsin, the Khabarovsk representative for Aleksei Navalny’s nationwide opposition movement, stated that he “would not be surprised if in the end it turns out that he was involved in those murders, considering the 'interesting' company he has kept” in his business dealings, but noted that nevertheless  “there is a political subtext in this case.”

The Kremlin’s decision to arrest Furgal rather than simply firing him or forcing him to resign makes a public example of an opponent that had grown more popular than Putin. Some analysts see the arrest as a message not only to the people and public figures of Khabarovsk Krai, but also to all governors across Russia who might challenge the supremacy of the Kremlin’s influence in their regions. The arrest was meant to underscore to regional governors, who had been given some autonomy in the wake of COVID-19, the importance of loyalty to the Kremlin. 

One critical signal the Kremlin uses to gauge loyalty is voter turnout. The 2020 Constitutional Referendum, which included amendments to extend Vladimir Putin’s eligibility for the presidency to 2036, was a perfect litmus test of regional loyalty to the president and his regime. Khabarovsk Krai exhibited the second-lowest voter turnout across all administrative divisions in Russia – just 44 percent. Furgal’s failure to mobilize sufficient voters in support of the Kremlin might have provided the final push to remove him from his position.

Two days after Furgal’s arrest, thousands of Khabarovsk residents gathered for a demonstration and march. Protesters carried posters in support of Furgal and chanted criticisms of Putin, proclaiming the need to defend “the choice of the people” expressed by the results of the 2018 elections, which, according to Carnegie Moscow Center political analyst Andrei Kolesnikov, were mainly “proof that many Russians are thumbing their noses at Moscow.”

Weekly gatherings of up to 50,000 protesters have continued for months after the arrest. The demonstrations are notable because (1) sustained protest is rare outside of Moscow and St. Petersburg, and (2) authorities have not been called in to disperse protesters. It is widely accepted that the protests have “unnerved” the Kremlin, but the end result remains unclear.

In the face of public outcry, Putin appointed Furgal’s replacement, Mikhail Degtyaryov, to remain in office until September 2021. The selection of an LDPR candidate rather than a governor from Putin’s own United Russia party should have satisfied critics; instead, it further inflamed protests because Degtyaryov is a Moscow-based politician and member of Putin’s “reserve cadre,” having completed a course in the presidential management academy. Protestors decry him as a national laughingstock with no connection to Khabarovsk and consider his appointment, in the words of activist Olga Bulgakova, “an act of humiliation.” 

More likely Putin’s choice reflected his decision to prioritize mending his relationship with the LDPR and its national leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky over mollifying the people of Khabarovsk Krai. Since the 2018 gubernatorial elections revealed the slipping grasp of the United Russia party, the smartest move for the Kremlin was to cut its losses and strengthen the regional political engine to avoid future electoral surprises.

International policymakers must further evaluate the ramifications of Furgal's arrest in the wider context of the Kremlin's recent actions. After the assassination of leading opposition figure Boris Nemtsov in February 2015 and the resulting mass protests, Putin adopted a policy of making concessions to the opposition in exchange for political stability and predictability. The gamble seemingly paid off, as Putin was reelected with 76 percent of the vote in 2018 and passed his constitutional reform by 78 percent in 2020, according to official statistics. 

However, ostensibly Kremlin-backed hits have been growing more frequent and brazen, from the poisoning of Sergei Skripal in Salisbury, to the slaying of a former Chechen commander in a Berlin park, to the attempted murder of opposition leader Navalny in Tomsk. While the Kremlin’s move against Navalny has for many years seemed inevitable, why eliminate him now? Two developments have potentially changed the Kremlin’s calculus: (1) constitutional amendments protecting Putin’s presidency until 2036, barring an effective opposition; and (2) unexpected anti-Putin protests in the usually quiet far eastern provinces, incited by Furgal’s arrest. Decapitation of Putin’s political opposition fits into a larger scheme to consolidate power in Russia, without concern for preserving a controllable opposition or preventing civil unrest.

The strike against Navalny both raises the stakes for foreign powers and provides them with an opportunity to act. The use of the chemical weapon Novichok sends a clear message that the sanctions against individuals involved in the Skripal poisoning were ineffective at reinforcing international norms, and that the European Union, the United States, and the United Kingdom will need to develop more compelling deterrents to prevent future transgressions. Under the governance of an increasingly unscrupulous and power-hungry Kremlin, domestic instability can quickly rise to the level of an international security threat.