Guinea-Gate

Tabloid newspaper Metro UK features an article on the Kremlin once again acting in aggression before their PR team can asses the situation. Case in point, the story features Nastya Ivliyeva, a thirteen-year-old girl who sent a message to Dmitry Medvedev’s website, requesting a guinea pig to accompany her existing one. 

As soon as local officials found out about the request they went to the girl’s school where she was called to the headmaster’s office and ticked off so badly that she burst into tears.

They then summoned Nastya’s parents to condemn them for bringing up a brazen child who would waste the president’s time on such trifling matters. Nastya was even forced to write a letter retracting her request.

But attitudes shifted when her parents complained to the president about the officials’ behaviour and a newspaper publicized the plight of the girl from Kalitvensky in southern Russia.

The next day, officials called again – but this time to hand over two guinea pigs and a cage.

The episode marked a ‘complete failure by the authorities to understand real people and their problems‘, said youth commitee leader Sergei Chyuev.