Patriots of the great fatherland (PVO) is a former The Great Fatherland Party and a Russian nationalist movement led by writer Nikolai Starikov. The party was liquidated in 2020 and turned into a public movement of the same name.
**Short story**
In April 2012 writer Nikolai Starikov together with Igor Ashmanov, head of the IT company Ashmanov and Partners, organized the New Great Russia party. On December 1, 2012, the founding congress of the All-Russian Political Party “Great Fatherland Party” took place. The party had 76 regional branches. In May 2014, party branches were registered in the Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol. On August 12, 2016, the CEC refused to register the candidate list of the Great Fatherland Party for the State Duma elections on the grounds that the permissible number of invalid or invalid signatures was exceeded. The party won seven seats in the 2014 municipal elections in St. Petersburg. In early September 2017 there was a split in the party between the Presidium of the Central Committee of the PMO and the party apparatus, which accused Starikov of embezzling funds collected for the widows of the Donbass militia. A videotape was provided as evidence. According to Viktor Sherenko, a former Great Fatherland Party member and co-founder of the Russian Citizens Trade Union, in August 2017, Nikolay Starikov made a call to collect money to help widows and orphans in Donbass, claiming to be a guarantor of the fairness and transparency of the process. After about 2.5 million roubles had been collected, Starikov allegedly wanted some of this money to be spent on the salaries of the party’s apparatus rather than on its intended purpose. There was a split in the party itself because of this, and the party was reorganized into a social movement. In response to attempts by Fontanka.ru journalists to comment on the situation, Starikov said that he was very busy and had no time to talk.
The losing side – former members of the executive committee – organized the organizing committee of the new “Russian Party of Socialism Today. The winning side – Starikov’s team – organized and moved to the all-Russian public movement “Patriots of the Great Fatherland” chaired by Starikov, retaining the abbreviated acronym and logo of the PMO. On March 19, 2020, the party was liquidated at the suit of the Ministry of Justice.
**Self descirption**
“The objectives of the Movement:
2.1.1 To promote unity and mutual trust, cooperation and civic solidarity for the sake of Russia’s historical success, its freedom, prosperity, well-being and security;
2.1.2. promoting Russia’s development as:
a strong, free, sovereign state, which is a leader in development and a center of attraction for many countries;
a powerful, modern, competitive economy with new industries and productions, a developed agro-industrial complex, new jobs, prestige of labor, and opportunities for everyone to create their own businesses;
a country of demographic growth, reliance on the family, care for children and future generations, the preservation of the multinational Russian people, the priority development of education, health, science, culture;
a country of modern standards of quality of life, care about nature and ecology, advanced infrastructure and comfortable life of all Russian spaces and regions;
a society of free and successful people, built on the values of love and respect for one’s country, justice, mutual respect and civic solidarity.
2.1.3 Support and ensure direct and continuous dialogue between the citizens and the President of the country, public monitoring and civil control over the implementation of laws, presidential initiatives and other priority government decisions and programs;
2.1.4 Involvement of citizens, organizations and institutions of civil society in constant joint work on determining the priorities of Russia’s development, enhancing opportunities for the power of the people, the real participation of all active and not indifferent citizens in the development of decisions of the government and local self-government;
2.1.5 Strengthening of social partnership and civil mutual aid, support of public self-organization, social creativity, volunteerism and other creative civil initiatives to solve the most important issues of the country’s development”.
