By Alexei Limanov, independent journalist, exclusive for Caucasus Times

PRAGUE, 25 February, Caucasus Times – Commenting on the recent “tax incident” in Dagestan, Paul Goble, a prominent American political scientist and diplomat, made an interesting comparison. The appointment and quick resignation of Vladimir Radchenko as Head of the Federal Tax Service in Dagestan has many similarities to the events of 1986 in what was then the Kazakh SSR, he says.

Let us revisit briefly the “December Events” of just over twenty years ago. On 16 December 1986, anti-government youth demonstrations took place in the otherwise stable Soviet Union (moreover, in Kazakhstan, considered then the “sanctuary of stagnation”). The main reason was Moscow’s perceived neglect of the republic’s interests. Tensions began when Mikhail Gorbachev, the Secretary-General of the Communist Party, decided to replace the long-time party leader of the Kazakh SSR, Dinmukhamed Kunaev, with Gennady Kolbin, an ethnic Russian who had not worked a single day in Kazakhstan, and who had previously been the First Secretary of the Ulyanovskii Oblast Committee. Although in December 1986 the government achieved its tactical objectives (i.e. securing Kolbin’s new post), a challenge had been thrown, from which it would not be able to recover, finally collapsing in another December, that of 1991, when the USSR legally ceased its existence.

In reality, how much does the “Radchenko Case” resemble the events of 1986 in Alma-Ata? Some formal similarities indeed exist. To begin, a “Varangian”(i.e. outsider, an official not from Dagestan) is appointed by Moscow to a post in the largest republic in the North Caucasus. Vladimir Radchenko began his career as a tax official in 1991, rising from a simple revenue inspector to head the tax authority in Karachaevo-Cherkessia. He served four years in this capacity (2001-2005), after which he was transferred to Moscow, where he worked as the head of one of the subdivisions of the local tax authority. After 2005, he had a brief career in business, which was interrupted when, in February 2009, the virtually anonymous official suddenly became the center of media attention.

The post taken by Radchenko in Dagestan had been vacant for several months. Its perennial occupant, Nazim Apaev, had resigned on 17 November 2008 (hence, the similarity with Kazakhstan, where Kunaev had been in office for 16 years). According to a Dagestani tradition, which began during the Soviet period, the post of “chief taxman” has to be filled by a Lezgin (the Lezgins are an ethnic group dominant in the southern part of the Republic). From November 2008 to February 2009, a number of candidatures had been put forth, including Ramazan Ramazanov (the chief district inspector for Derbent and the Derbent District), and Derbent mayor Felix Kaziakhmedov. However, on 2 February 2009 it became known that Dagestan’s tax authority would be led by Vladimir Radchenko.

As soon as this information became public, mass demonstrations against the new official began (again, we see similarities between this and the Alma-Ata precedent, when the cadre replacement was met not with quiet bureaucratic sabotage, but rather with mass demonstrations).

Upon crossing Dagestan’s administrative border, Vladimir Radchenko was met by representatives from the Republic’s law enforcement agencies, who informed him that the tax authority building has been mined. Demonstrations were soon under way, stopping traffic along Yagarskii St. In an interview with the online publication Kavkazskii uzel one of the demonstrators said, “It is time to end the practice of inviting ‘Varangians’ from other regions. Do we in Dagestan not have enough worthy experts who would be able to fill this role?” Rather than dispute that claim, let us make some observations. First of all, Dagestan has not seen a particularly dynamic rotation among its ruling elites (President Mukhu Aliev, for example, was the former Communist Party leader of the Dagestani SSR). Second of all, there aren’t very many ‘Varangians’ in the country’s federal structures to begin with (compared to other Caucasian republics, excluding Chechnya, which has “special status,” and whose president has a special relationship with the Kremlin and Parliament). The demonstrators’ position is not a scientific thesis; it is a political position. According to this position, Dagestan should be maximally guarded against “outside influences” (even though it is part of Russia and its jurisdiction). Here, again, we see another similarity with Alma-Ata. The Kazakh youth of that period was protesting against “special statuses” held by Soviet republics. It was an assertion of “a certain kind of socialism mixed with a local, feudal flavor.”

This is where similarities between the Dagestani and Kazakh “incidents” end. Radchenko is not the head of state. His appointment is not an assault on Dagestan’s administrative market (which was true in the case of Gennadii Kolbin in Kazakhstan). It is merely a timid attempt to interfere in this administrative market, and even so – only in one of its segments. And it is no fact that this reflects the will of the federal government (which was the case with Gorbachev). It is no surprise that both in Moscow and in Makhachkala rumors were circulating that Radchenko was “Suleiman Kerimov’s man” (the latter is a powerful Moscow businessman of Dagestani descent). Even if this is no more than a rumor, it is noteworthy. The involvement of the federal government in the “Radchenko Case” was almost negligible. Once again, Moscow “washed her hands,” as she used to do during instances of conflict between Chechen presidents and ethnic Russian prime ministers (today, this seems like an entirely different historical period).

In February 2009, once again, it became more advantageous for the Kremlin not to “interfere.” It is known that the Russian President Dmitry Medvedev met with Mukhu Aliev on 10 March, but it is difficult to determine how seriously they discussed the “Radchenko Case.” Readers and television viewers only saw official, propagandist quotes, like this one by Medvedev: “You, as the leader of the republic, must be more attentive when it comes to issues like crime and security.” Who would disagree? Yet on February 2nd and 9th, the “head taxman” was unable to reach his office, and on the 6th “Radchenko the Varangian” was kidnapped, albeit only for a brief period of time. Are these not issues related to crime and security?

In post-Soviet Dagestan, unlike in Kazakhstan, public demonstrations have become commonplace. Last March, local police staged protests, calling on the country’s Minister of the Interior and the head of the Office of the Public Prosecutor to resign. Such things would be difficult to imagine in the period of “early perestroika.” This, too, is an indicator that federal law enforcement structures are serving informal functions in addition to their formal responsibilities. Today, representatives from the tax authority claim that “taxmen” did not participate in demonstrations; however, other theories exist regarding the involvement of officials from various levels of the bureaucracy in the process of “squeezing out the Varangian.”

Unlike Kazakhstan’s “hot December,” Dagestan’s “hot February” was marked the protests’ lack of ideology. One could hardly consider the demand to appoint “one of our own” instead of “not one of our own” ideologically motivated. And, in this case, the line between “one of our own” and “not one of our own” was not one drawn on ethnic grounds. Whereas in December 1986 Kazakhs fought for Kunaev as “one of their own” against Kolbin, who was “not one of their own,” in 2009 ethnicity was not a deciding factor. The hypothesis regarding the “Lezgin candidature” is insufficient, and schematic at the least. Konstantin Kazenin, a Russian expert on the Caucasus, is fair in his assessment: “First of all, the quotation marks around the term “Lezgin uprising” need to be big and bold. Is it really conceivable that an average Dagestani of Lezgin ethnicity, and of stable mind, really cares about the legal nationality of the chief taxman – note, not of his city or district, but of the entire country? Only a naïve consumer of Caucasian orientalism would believe such a thing. Besides, there are plenty of Lezgins surrounding the influential persons who supported bringing Mr. Radchenko to the Republic.” Hence, the connection mentioned earlier between Radchenko and Kerimov, an ethnic Lezgin. A number of figures of Avar descent were listed as Radchenko’s malefactors in Makhachkala; among them, the taxman himself mentions the current president’s son.