Vladimir Gusinsky锟絪 media empire was another logical place to start
锟絛eoligarchization.锟?Gusinsky锟絪 vast media holdings, which included
Russia锟絪 main independent station, NTV had been amassed thanks to
political connections and, first of all, to the backing his media
outlets had provided to Yeltsin in his 1996 reelection campaign.
In the run-up
to the 1999 parliamentary and 2000 presidential elections the
powerful media mogul is rumored to have demanded vast economic and
financial concessions from Putin in return for the backing of his
media empire. When his demands were met with refusal, Gusinsky锟絪
media supported the anti-Putin side in both elections. Following the
elections, NTV continued to criticize Putin and his policies,
reporting aggressively on the war in Chechnya, official corruption,
and the embarrassing scandal surrounding the sinking of the
submarine Kursk in August 2000.
The clouds
over the media tycoon began to gather in the summer of 2000, when
Gusinsky was arrested and jailed on charges of financial fraud.
After three days, however, he was released, charges against him were
dropped, and it looked as if he had agreed to give up his media
empire in exchange for immunity from prosecution. Gusinsky then fled
abroad, where he resumed the legal battle against NTV锟絪 powerful
creditor Gazprom, which, goaded on by the Kremlin, strove to declare
his business empire bankrupt and take control of the television
company.
The intense
wrangle continued for ten months and involved an extradition battle
in Spanish courts. Finally, in April 2001, Gazprom cobbled together
a majority of shares in NTV and launched a coup: at an extraordinary
meeting in Moscow shareholders unceremoniously fired the board and
tossed out the company锟絪 general director and Gusinsky锟絪 close ally,
Evgeny Kiselev. Gusinsky effectively lost control of NTV, but
managed to escape criminal prosecution, as Spain refused to hand him
over to Russia.