Looks like Hugo Chavez’s fabled sense of smell has finally deserted him. How else to explain the Venezuelan leader’s puzzling decision to take lessons in socialist town planning from Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov.
True, Luzhkov can boast of his victorious controversial Gen Plan, a 15 year development blueprint for Moscow, which was passed today (using some serious United Russia strong-arming).
But that is nothing to celebrate, let alone emulate!
Luzhkov is a man notorious for bulldozing some of the city’s most colourful and historic areas to make way for megalomaniac, Donald Trump style high rises often built, conveniently enough, by a construction firm owned by his famously litigious billionaire wife Yelena Baturina, who is also Russia’s richest woman.
Russia’s Gazeta ru reported yesterday that he is on his way to Venezuela (with Baturina in tow) to promote a town planning scheme for Caracas.
But if there’s one thing that reeks of sulphur it’s Luzhkov’s own General Plan for the Russian capital, which has passed today despite being roundly condemned by local residents, conservationists and professional town planners alike.
Here’s how a Radio Liberty article describes the reaction to the General [Development] Plan, which would oversee the destruction of 5 million square metres of property, build over 200 million sq m more, and take 15 years to accomplish:
“The present Genplan is a death sentence for Moscow. This document doesn’t have the moral right to be called a General Plan, because it’s not strategic — it’s not a way out of the crisis Moscow is in at the moment,” the preservationist Alexei Klimenko said.
Marat Gelman, head of the Museum of Modern Art in Perm, put is most starkly:
“For us, Moscow is love, but for [Mayor Yury] Luzhkov, it’s a vegetable patch, from which he harvests”.
He added: “Everyone knows that the Genplan is bad, but they are passing it for three reasons: greed, cowardice and indifference”.
That does not sound like a very Bolivarian formula. But then again, Chavez’s recent performance is more similar to Putinite corporatism than revolutionary socialism, anyway.
But why is Luzhkov going to Venezuela? A building contract from the friendly and oil rich state would certainly help to keep his wife comfortably on the Forbes list.
Even more importantly, indulging in his own mini foreign policy could help bolster Luzhkov’s hand against Putin, with whom he has a very uneasy relationship.
Indeed, obituaries for Luzhkov’s political career have been popping up constantly over the last three years. In 2008, Stratfor predicted that he would be forced out by Putin by the year’s end. The assessment reads:
It has never been a secret that Luzhkov and Russian President Vladimir Putin do not get along. Putin has long wanted to go after Luzhkov and end his reign over Moscow and the construction business, but the president has held back because of Luzhkov’s many political backers in the Duma and supposed Mafia ties. Moreover, Luzhkov is on the board of Putin’s political party, United Russia.
STRATFOR sources say Putin has given Luzhkov until the fall to tie up loose ends in his mayoral post, and he must then resign.
It’s 2010, and Luzhkov still isn’t going anywhere, except Caracas.