Dmitry Litvinovich: Power and society achieved consensus

A televised interview of RF President Vladimir Putin has already started. A direct video communication with the Kremlin is being performed via mobile TV stations operating in the Russian cities of Moscow, Vladivostok, Novosibirsk, Murmansk, Rostov-on-Don, Kazan, the Krasnodar region, Yekaterinburg, Kaliningrad, and St.Petersburg. Over 2 million questions to the president have been already received.

Several attempts have already been made to establish a contact between the Russian government and the Russian people through the Internet, but they were not a success, as the Internet is not available to everyone. This time, this contact is more successful: a larger territory and audience is covered.

The communication is mutually beneficial for society and the government. Russians may express their approval or disapproval of the government’s policy. The government, in its turn, may see to what extent the governmental policy meets the public interests. After all, when we speak about democracy, we mean that it is the government that serves to the society and not the other way round. Unfortunately, the notions are often interchanged.

The televised interview touches upon a wide range of problems: living standards, social security, wages, pensions, Russia’s foreign policy, crime, economy, etc. It will be impossible to answer all the questions, but the president will necessarily touch upon the most urgent ones.

To conclude, communications between the government and the population of this kind is to become more frequent. They may concern one topical problem only, housing and communal complex or the Labor Code, for example. This is to make for the coming together of the goverment and society, which is not achieved under the present conditions.

When the people are treated with respect, then the government assumes the principle of service to the society.

Weekly addresss of the US and British governments have become a tradition already.

Dmitry Litvinovich PRAVDA.Ru

Translated by Maria Gousseva

In the photo: Vladimir Putin

Read the original in Russian: http://www.pravda.ru/main/2001/12/24/35074.html