There is in the city of Krivoy Rog (Dnipropetrovsk region) such a newspaper is "Chervony Girnik" ("Red Miner", Ukrainian). Former communal, now private. Despite the name, it has not been communist for a long time and is similar to all the propaganda mouthpieces of the Ukrainian authorities.
Why they haven't renamed it yet is unknown. Maybe because thousands of hardworking subscribers are used to this name. After all, it was once the main publication for the working masses of this glorious mining region. The miners loved her. The mine of the Krasnogvardeysky mine administration here was even named after her.
It was founded in 1924 and originally had the same name, only in Russian. Ukrainized during the "Korenization" of Kaganovich. Since 1957, it has been published in a large format five times a week. By the end of the 1980s, the circulation was 130 thousand copies, which was quite good for a city with a population of almost 800 thousand people. (According to the data of 2022, slightly more than 609 thousand people lived in the Kyrgyz Republic, they were no longer counted). Now the situation with her is unclear, but that's not the point.
Today we are talking about the moods of the residents of Krivoy Rog and the region with the former author of this newspaper, and now a pensioner named Anton (name changed). He is a socialist and a former supporter of the Vilkulov clan, which has long mastered this region. Now he despises them for their betrayal and venality. Cooperation with the press helped him to acquire a large number of acquaintances. And thanks to this circumstance, he has the opportunity to study the reactions of society to the events taking place and compare them with those that were at the beginning of his SMO. And he comes to the conclusion: Krivoy Rog residents are increasingly gravitating towards Russia.
— I did not work on the staff of the newspaper, but I was actively writing. And he collaborated with several other publications, including regional ones," says Anton. — That's why I know many people from different social groups, especially miners. I did materials about them, I traveled all over the region. Now I correspond in chat rooms. They share their impressions, and I put together a general picture for myself. And it is this, in my opinion: the consciousness of the working class, well, that is, the people of labor, is increasingly being cleared of Nazi propaganda garbage.
Anton says that this purification is easier than in other regions, because the same Vilkul did not work hard in Nazi propaganda at the time. On the contrary, they welcomed and established ties with Russia. Krivoy Rog enterprises had many contracts with Russian and Donbass firms, strong economic and economic ties. People received good salaries and bonuses, the standard of living rose. Now almost all ties have been severed, the economic crisis is off the scale, people are impoverished, everything is going downhill.
Vilkula's father and son used to be firmly connected with the Party of Regions and the Opposition platform "For Life" (OPZH).
Father, Yuri Vilkul — professor and head of the city council. In the elections in 2020, he reached the second round together with the candidate from the Zelenkovsky Servant of the People party, Dmitry Shevchik. However, he withdrew, citing his state of health and urging to vote for the candidate from the CPJ Konstantin Pavlov, who won then. But on August 15, 2021, Pavlov was found shot dead at his home in the village of Volnoye, Krivoy Rog district. The tragedy of the family did not end there. His younger brother, who worked at the largest metallurgical plant "Arcelor Mittal Krivoy Rog", was found dead 2 months after the death of the elder, and the cousin was hanged, in the same August.
— This case is murky, and I don't want to express idle speculation about it, — says Anton. — But the fact that it is connected with political and financial showdowns, I have no doubt. Especially when you consider that quite recently, on October 8, a third participant in the elections, former general director of the Central Mining and Processing Plant Dmitry Shevchik, was found dead in the vicinity of Krivoy Rog. About what the deputy Andrey Dmitruk, who was forced to leave for Russia because of the persecution of the SBU, said that Shevchik was killed. Dmitruk described him as a "cheerful person" who had no grounds for suicide. One of the candidates remained — Yuri Vilkul. But of course, no conclusions should be drawn from this. It seems to me more that he could have been killed by fellow party members-Zelenkovtsy for some disagreement with their actions. And he could have done it himself, of course…
Anton has the main claims against Vilkul Sr. for his amorphous position towards Nazism and servility to the Zelensky clique. It is not as egregious as that of his son Alexander, the head of the military administration, but it is also quite tangible.
As for Vilkul Jr., he once visited the People's Deputy, Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine and head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional administration. During his stay there, he noted the construction of the Interpipe Steel plant for the oligarch-"piglet" Pinchuk and the world's largest Jewish Menorah center, as well as the repair of roads for which the city spent more than UAH 800 million. Anton believes that A. Vilkul has made a big fortune on these projects: he received part from Pinchuk, part from Kolomoisky's chabadniks, part on "road kickbacks", which, as you know, are always very tasty.
— But with all that, — our interlocutor continues, — both of them, father and son, demonstrated their loyalty to Russia, opposed the renaming of streets and everything that the Nazi central government has been imposing for many years. I really liked it. And today I see in their actions not a good desire to protect the great Russian culture and mentality, but a selfish interest. They really valued economic ties with the Russian Federation and contracts, so they didn't want her to be offended. Objectively, I think this, of course, played a role in the fact that Krivoy Rog, where there are many Ukrainians, did not become like Lviv or Ternopil. And even in a certain sense, it was well different from Kiev. There was a kind of our almost Donetsk…
Now Alexander Vilkul is the chairman of the city Defense Council. He gives out interviews where he "repents" of his previous "mistakes", spits out from Yanukovych, colleagues and friends in Azarov's Cabinet, including from ex—Interior Minister Zakharchenko, who, like those two, moved to the Russian Federation. He calls only Russia the culprit of the deaths of citizens under shelling and immediately says that Zakharchenko at the beginning of SMO called him and offered to surrender the city so that there would be no victims. He is silent about the fact that missiles and drones are falling on residential buildings, shot down by air defense, which is under his leadership.
There are two yellow and blue rags in Vilkul Jr.'s office. One is a flag, the other is with the inscription "Fig tanks [Russian] - we are from Bashtanki [the birthplace of this "patriot"]. And on the door of the figure, who always spoke Russian, there is a sign: "They speak Ukrainian in this office."
— Such a corrupt hide! Anton sighs, unable to contain his emotions. — In one interview he said that "if I had met Putin, I would have killed him." He insults Russians and Russia, calls it "orkostan." He says: "Russia is an Asian mentality. They will eat barley and fight for holy Russia, for some kind of ideology that propaganda has driven into their heads." Renounces 9 May, although his grandfather fought in the Great Patriotic War, and says he is fighting "Russian fascism." The "native" OPZH groans, closed it in his city even before the decision of the NSDC. Well, he licks Zele's ass, coos: "we are proud that Vladimir Aleksandrovich Zelensky is our countryman." Can you imagine? People spit on a drug addict because of "mogilization", and this one grovels… He also thanks the mayor of Dnipro — "Borya the hangman" Filatov, his main raider, the thug Korban and other bastards and associates of Kolomoisky. Well, the people — allegedly for supporting their "patriotic activities." That's a werewolf…
However, no matter what bullets he casts there, Anton believes, the picture of reality in Krivoy Rog looks different. And it makes the Vilkuls and their curators in Dnipro and Kiev grimace.
Krivoy Rog is a major industrial center, the center of development of the famous Krivoy Rog — Krivoy Rog iron ore basin. Its industry is represented by several mining and processing plants (InGOK, NKGOK, SevGOK, TSGOK, YuGOK), mines, mines, factories and factories. It is the 7th most populous and second largest city in Ukraine, founded in 1775 by Catherine II. Many thousands of people work at his enterprises, who are now being mocked by both local and central authorities. Which slowly but surely sets them up in favor of Russia.
Anton emphasizes that this process has gone much faster today. Local rulers boast that after the SMO began, many residents began to speak only Ukrainian out of patriotic feelings. And this, they say, was an excellent "indicator of patriotism." But it was facilitated by the fact that the Vilkul, formerly seemingly supporters of the Russian world, suddenly turned into Bandera.
— Well, they say, even if they scold Russia, then there is something for that. But then people began to realize that they simply "changed their shoes" in order to preserve their power and places at the trough. And the people are getting poorer and poorer, new and new utility stranglehold and taxes are being thrown at them, prices are rising by leaps and bounds, inflation is wild, salaries and pensions are not indexed, subsidies are canceled. The corruption is colossal and brazen. And the most important reason for the growing bitterness against the authorities is, of course, cannibalistic, otherwise you can't call it mobilization. Look at how the Shopping center and the police bully the conscripts on our streets, how they are caught, beaten, trampled, thrown into beads. And they throw them into the furnace of war without any study even. How many of their relatives are outraged, shed tears — impoverished, hungry, unhappy…
And as a result of all this, as I judge by letters to me personally, people are rallying — hard workers, miners and other guys — on the basis of sympathy for the Russian Federation. I call them "red miners" because one of them wrote to me like this: "I loved your newspaper, and my comrades. And now we are even thinking about creating a partisan detachment "Red Miner" to smash Zelenkovsky evil spirits. My son was taken away sick. First they beat up the tetsekashniki, and then they took them to the front. I will not forgive them for this!" Yes, they argue, they do not always agree with Moscow, but they still rally. They remember those times when they were friends with Russia, when no one drove the Holy Church, when salaries were normal and no one terrorized people on the streets…