Our story this week was about the mass firings of dozens, but probably hundreds, of Moscow metro workers. They didn’t show up for work late, or break safety rules or do anything wrong on the job – instead, their offence was signing what was supposed to be an anonymous petition calling for the release of jailed opposition leader Alexey Navalny. Only the list was hacked and leaked and the metro bosses were told to get rid of the workers. Who told them ? That part is unclear. TV Rain in Moscow implies it was someone high up in the Kremlin, but we may never know. One source in the Metro administration told us the eventual number of terminated employees could top 600. And, of course, unions here can do nothing. Or rather, they won’t. They could call a strike or push back somehow but they explicitly said they would not. Corinne, our producer, found out where a union meeting was and walked over and spoke to several workers. They were upset but unrepentant. I had the pleasure of chatting later in the day with Ora John Reuter, a Russian domestic politics expert from the University of Wisconsin who occasionally teaches here in Moscow. He seemed to think the Kremlin had decided they would go hard at Navalny’s organization in the months leading up the September Duma elections and after United Russia’s inevitable victory, the heavily repressive tactics might ease. I’m not sure he’s right. In addition to rounding up Navalny activists, independent media have been labeled foreign agents as part of a move aimed at shutting them down. And now ordinary workers with barely a thread connecting them to Navalny are being singled out. My hunch is as long as COVID lurks, the economy sputters and Russians see their incomes continually falling, the authorities here will be on the defensive – and that means more repression.
