Victoria Bonya lives in the principality of Monaco, has over 13 million followers on Instagram and became internationally famous in 2022 for cutting up some Chanel bags in protest against the sanctions imposed by the European Union on Moscow after the invasion of Ukraine. However, the greatest source of her fame is her activity as a beauty influencer. In a video published in the last few hours and which immediately went viral, he decided to spread highly political content. A very harsh attack against Russian President Vladimir Putin: “People are afraid of you”, begins Victoria, addressing the head of the Kremlin directly. “Bloggers are afraid, artists are afraid of you, governors too. And you are the president of our country.”
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No mention of the war and the Kremlin responding to it: the effects on the regime
Then he makes a series of precise criticisms, lashing out against the restrictions on social media and the web imposed by the regime; the ineffectiveness of state interventions after the floods in Dagestan, the management of livestock slaughter in Siberia. The war in Ukraine is not directly mentioned, however. And, not even open references to Putin or the conflict appear in the comments.
The influencers’ criticisms focus heavily on the internal problems most perceived by the average population, and certainly represent a severe blow for Putin, given the poor polls in view of the next parliamentary elections. However, there is another interpretation: rather unusually, after the video the Kremlin made it known that it was working to address the problems reported by Victoria Bonya. It is not excluded that in view of the electoral consultations, Putin’s regime may have an interest in appearing more open and attentive to the problems of the Russian population, in the hope of gaining greater support.