Putin's Enemy No 1

Popular activist Alexei Navalny is proving a headache for Russia’s leader with his relentless anti-corruption campaign

- Dennis Cavernelis

He’s long been a thorn in the side of the Russian leader and for years the Kremlin has tried to silence him – yet despite the fact he’s been persecuted, jailed and poisoned, he refuses to be muzzled.

And Alexei Navalny’s latest deed of defiance might well be his boldest yet. The 44-year-old Russian activist and politician recently released a video that’s had jaws dropping around the world – and clearly rattled Russian president Vladimir Putin.

The film is of what Navalny calls “Putin’s Palace”, a staggeringly ostentatious development second only in cost to Buckingham Palace.

The R22,4-billion estate on the shores of the Black Sea spares no expense: Included in the litany of luxury is an R14 000 toilet brush, an R20 000 toilet roll holder, an R896 000 custom-made Italian table, and an R432 000 sofa.

The film racked up more than 100 million views in the first week of its release and has appalled Putin opponents – but the president himself denies the property belongs to him or any member of his family.

However, the fact that he publicly denied ownership on state TV was taken by his critics as a sign he was unsettled by the exposé, as well as Navalny’s assertion that the palace was built with money funnelled to Putin by corrupt oligarchs.

The property, which is in an Italian palazzo style, “is an entire city, or rather a kingdom”, Navalny says in his video.

“It has impregnable fences, its own port, its own security, a church, a no-fly zone and even its own border checkpoint.”