On April 24, the reception room of Svetlana Kaverzina, an independent city councilor and advocate for direct elections of the mayor of Novosibirsk, was vandalized by unknown individuals. This incident occurred on the same day that an application to vote on the initiative was submitted, as reported by Kaverzina on her Telegram channel.
Unknown individuals vandalized the reception room of Svetlana Kaverzina, a City Council member who represents the Coalition Novosibirsk 2020 opposition group. The attackers broke down the door and smashed a window. The room was undergoing repairs, with new doors and windows already installed. Kaverzina reported the incident to 7x7 and indicated that the police had visited the location.
On the day of the attack, the organizing committee for the direct mayoral election, which includes Kaverzina, was planning to submit a motion for general elections. If approved, it would pave the way for independent representatives to collect signatures for a referendum in late June. Eventually, on April 24, Kaverzina's colleague Anton Kartavin took the documents to the election commission.
Coalition Novosibirsk 2020 was established by social activists and politicians ahead of the 2020 City Council elections, and four of its candidates were elected, including Anton Kartavin, Svetlana Kaverzina, Sergey Boyko, and Helga Pirogova.
The elections for the mayor of Novosibirsk were canceled by the regional legislature on February 20, 2023. Governor Andrei Travnikov initially announced this initiative in December 2022. Currently, mayoral elections remain in Khabarovsk, Anadyr, Abakan, Yakutsk, and Ulan-Ude, along with the cities of “federal importance.”
