Earlier today, Vladimir Pekhtin, a senior lawmaker within Russia's ruling United Russia party, announced his resignation.
Pekhtin was not only one of the co-founders of United Russia, one of the key drivers of support for Vladimir Putin, he was also on the State Duma's Credentials and Ethics Commission.
Unfortunately, it appears to have been his own ethnics that have done him in. Last week, popular blogger and opposition leader Alexey Navalny published a post that appeared to reveal Pekhtin owned two luxury condos, a house and a plot of land worth more than $2 million. These properties were not declared to the Russian parliament, a breach of protocol.
Here's one on Ocean Drive. Marc Cuban is reported to also own a unit in this building.
And over here there's one on Bay Road.
And here's a house Pekhtin reportedly owns. Note the nice swimming pools.
This is a big scalp for Navalny, who was one of the biggest faces in the opposition during the 2011/2012 Russian protests, but has faced a legal clampdown since the election. Navalny is now gloating on his blog.
While Pekhtin hasn't admitted to doing anything wrong, the news came at a bad time for him — the New York Times notes that the day before Navalny's blog post came out, Putin had proposed laws that would stop Russian officials outside of the country. While property would not be so banned, it was still just too embarrassing for the Moscow elites.
It may just be the start as well. A United Russia deputy, billionaire Anatony Lomakin, resigned a few hours after Pekhtin.
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