Residents of Chechnya express scepticism about Kadyrov's promise to dismiss officials

On January 17, the leader of Chechnya announced his intention to dismiss the heads of departments and municipalities if their activities in the first quarter of 2019 would be ineffective. Instead of loud resignations, personnel changes of officials close to Ramzan Kadyrov are likely to be expected, local residents say.

The Chechen leader has voiced his intention to dismiss officials during his working meeting with Abdukakhiyr Israyilov and Alambek Yasaev, the chiefs of the administration of the leader and government of the Chechnya and the secretariat of the Chechen leader. A report about the above working meeting was shown at night news on the Chechen State Radio and TV Company (ChGTRK) "Grozny" on January 17.

According to Ramzan Kadyrov, every responsible official must have all the information about the state of his area of responsibility.

"A minister who failed to fulfil any assignment should leave. Any assistant, adviser, or deputy head who does not understand his work should also leave," said Ramzan Kadyrov, whose statement was translated into Russian by the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

Members of Chechen NGOs have noted that earlier, the leader of Chechnya had already voiced threats to dismiss unscrupulous officials.

"Ramzan Kadyrov voices such kind of threat not for the first time. However, loud resignations happen very rarely. We mostly see just a shift of the same officials in power," the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent was told by Aslanbek, a local observer.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on January 18, 2019 at 12:41 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.