Becoming a Russian Oligarch After Rebirth
Chapter 981 - 890: A Display of Authority_2

Chapter 981: Chapter 890: A Display of Authority_2

And all of this was chosen by the voters with their ballots!

Even though Wang Ye, as the Faction Party Leader, or shall we say the First Vice Speaker, couldn’t do anything to the other side temporarily without them committing some unforgivable sin.

Of course, once he knew who harbored different opinions, he could slowly marginalize them.

For instance, by not allowing such people to join some core committees, or letting them participate in faction affairs, isolating them.

Come the next roster change election, he wouldn’t provide any resource support or even might let a more capable member go to their original "turf" to snatch votes...

Now the faction’s strength had greatly increased, possessing 150 seats in the Duma, but it was clear that many issues had arisen within the faction.

The new members who had just joined and the old ones had implicitly divided into two groups, competing with each other.

All these required the Party Leader Wang Ye to balance.

......

At this moment, the tallied votes had come in at 225:224, leaving only the last vote!

If the last vote was affirmative, then Medvedev would barely scrape by. Although it wouldn’t look good, at least it would pass.

But if the final vote was against, that would be awkward...

This vote was critically important for Medvedev, who watched the vote counter’s lips nervously, dreading her utterance of the word "Niet"—meaning opposition.

But what he feared most came to pass, the emotionless vote counter announced loudly, "Niet!"

A chorus of sighs rose in the hall, and Medvedev’s face turned a bit pale as he stood there, looking crestfallen and seemingly more frail.

By this time, Wang Ye’s expression had relaxed somewhat.

Since the result was already out, it wasn’t too bad, a tie!

It seemed a second round of voting decisions was inevitable. He would then do some work so that members of his faction would cast about ten more votes in the next round, ensuring that Medvedev would make it through in the second voting decision.

Grezlov’s face revealed a hint of a smile as he coughed, banged the little gavel with a "bang" and loudly declared, "Voting is over, the Kremlin’s nomination for Prime Minister has not passed! Adjourned!"

The congressmen got up one after another, walking out of the large conference hall while discussing amongst themselves.

Today’s event was quite unusual!

Normally, the Kremlin’s face had to be considered, especially when it involved important human resources arrangements, and the Duma was just going through the motions.

In the last Duma, several years’ worth of votes on human resources arrangements or policy regulations proposed by the Kremlin all passed by a high margin!

Not even once were they rejected.

But in this current Duma, today marked the first time an issue from the Kremlin needed a voting decision, and it was outright rejected...

Many congressmen had already realized that perhaps, from this day forward, the Duma would no longer be the same, and the Kremlin, too, had changed!

......

Medvedev stood alone at the podium, appearing somewhat at a loss and instinctively turned his head to look toward the speaker’s platform.

Once again, his gaze met Wang Ye’s.

Wang Ye smiled and nodded at him, then rose from the speaker’s platform and exited through the side door.

Rilinov did not return to his office but went with Wang Ye to his office.

He had a bellyful of words he wanted to say.

Once inside the office, Rilinov couldn’t wait to speak, "Today’s event was really strange! Our faction’s votes should have been solid, so where did the problem arise? Could it be..."

Wang Ye shook his head, "Hard to say, it could be from the first faction, or perhaps from our faction here. You know, right before the Duma’s roster change, our faction welcomed many new members, and I don’t quite have that strong a control over the faction yet."

Rilinov nodded and then asked, "So, what do we do next? The Kremlin has suffered such a big loss; they surely won’t give in. I reckon the second round of voting will happen very soon."

Wang Ye smiled and spoke calmly, "We’ll be more secure in the next one. Your faction will add another ten affirmative votes, and our faction... let’s add twenty more. As for the first faction, there’s no point counting on them. They’re probably in fierce internal strife. That Gavriil could muster about sixty votes is already quite an achievement."

Indeed, the Moscow Faction, needless to say, would certainly oppose; although their seats were now fewer, they were very united!

After all, they were an established faction, and their members were all from the same lineage. With a significant reduction in their seats this term, those who were eliminated were relatively more marginal members of the faction.

It was as if they had helped their faction to "purify" itself; those who remained in the Duma as Congressmen were definitely the true core and backbone of the Moscow Faction!

That’s why they were so cohesive...

Besides the Moscow Faction, possibly the one with the biggest objection to the Kremlin’s nomination this time was the first faction...

The reason has already been explained, so there’s no need to repeat it.

After a moment of thought, Rilinov nodded and agreed, "No problem, our faction isn’t really interested in that position anyways. They should give me this face, ten votes won’t be a problem."

Of course, what Wang Ye was not asking was for Rilinov’s faction to cast only ten affirmative votes at the next vote, but to add another ten votes on top of the current ones, which would make seventy votes!

This still posed some difficulty since Rilinov’s faction had only about eighty seats in total.

Honestly, Wang Ye’s situation was not very easy either, with a total of one hundred and fifty seats, intending to secure one hundred and twenty affirmative votes was not a low hurdle to overcome.

Because Wang Ye’s control over his faction was not very strong as they were still in a phase of consolidation.

.........

While Wang Ye was discussing with Rilinov, his cellphone rang. He picked it up and saw that it was Gavriil calling.

Rilinov tactfully got up to take his leave.

Only after Rilinov had left the office did Wang Ye answer the call, knowing what Gavriil wanted to talk about.

As expected, as soon as the call was connected, Gavriil’s voice came through.

"Misha, how could this happen!

Where did things go wrong, and what’s more frustrating is that we were just one vote short.

Ah, just one vote!"

Wang Ye spoke indifferently, "The first faction received too few affirmative votes! Rilinov and I have tried our best to secure you one hundred sixty votes, but the first faction didn’t even get sixty-five."

There was a pause on Gavriil’s end. Although he was very dissatisfied and angry with the voting results of the day,

he knew very well that he couldn’t blame Wang Ye!

Even if there was a problem with the votes on Wang Ye’s side, he couldn’t speak to Wang Ye in an accusing tone.

After all, the Wang Ye of today was no longer the somewhat naive young man of three years ago, who followed his uncle Khodorkovsky...

He hesitated a bit before asking, "If we propose a second round of voting decision right away, do you... have confidence?"

Wang Ye chuckled and said flatly, "If you can guarantee that the first faction’s affirmative votes will not decrease and will at least get sixty-five, there shouldn’t be a problem."

Gavriil’s side breathed a sigh of relief, and his tone became more cheerful.

"That’s good, that’s good!

Securing sixty-five votes is definitely not an issue; I will immediately continue to work on this and move toward a second vote as quickly as possible.

Such matters can not be delayed; the longer it drags on, the bigger the impact on the Kremlin!"

Indeed, the Kremlin’s Prime Minister nomination being rejected by the Duma was absolutely major news!

And for the Kremlin, it would have a negative impact. The only way to mitigate this impact was to act quickly.

That is to proceed with a second vote as soon as possible, and make sure it passes...

......

After hanging up, Wang Ye lit a cigarette and stood by the window, gazing out at the Moscow River not too far away, somewhat lost in thought.

Strictly speaking, if he had put his full effort into supporting Medvedev, one voting decision would have been enough to settle it.

Now, after all this trouble, it was still Medvedev who became the Prime Minister in the end. What was the point in that?

In fact, Wang Ye’s thought process was quite simple—he was looking to teach Medvedev a lesson...