Media Bridge: Not for Sale
Vladimir Gusinski, President of Media Bridge, says he is not going to sell his holding to the Russia’s Gazprom. Bridge media try to cover the news in Russia in an unbiased manner. Mr. Gusinski accuses those in power of having forced him to sign the sale contract. In fact, the deal began being “negotiated” in a Butyrka prison cell. Apparently, the state was in a stronger position than the prisoner, offering freedom, closing the criminal case, and a trip abroad in exchange for the controlling interest in the firm.
Indeed, the criminal case was closed and Mr. Gusinski is now safe abroad. Recently, the Russian television audiences could watch the blacklisted oligarch at the same table with the US President. He appears to have taken good care of his future while still in Moscow, video-recording a statement about the unlawfulness of further company sale procedures, in the presence of two certified lawyers. Gazprom will apparently have a hard time proving in any court, even in Russia, that Gusinski’s hand was not forced.
The main point, however, is when the Russian leadership panics it resorts to heavy pressure and arbitrary prosecution to get the media under control, even at the cost of losing face internationally. The reason is simple, of course: the Kremlin is loath to endure further criticism like after the Kursk tragedy. Nor does the Russian President like to be offended. And so forth.
Yet this is only part of the truth. In Russia — and not just there — we are witness to a process of property reallocation whereby experienced businessmen take advantage of the complexes suffered by political neophytes to get hold of the market. Television professionals have long regarded the Russian Ministry of the Press as a Media International holding company. MI, formerly headed by Minister Mikhail Lesin, is preparing to seize NTV after the company passes into Gazprom’s hands.
Are the people in the Kremlin aware that they are actually shaping a new oligarchic group that will subsequently dictate its own conditions to the powers that be, creating their own Putin, if and when they should fail to come to terms with the current President? Not likely, because the Kremlin is obsessed with the idea of total control, not understanding that it is trying to enforce this old type of control at the turn of a new millennium.
