An Altai deputy was forced to resign after refusing to support municipal reform.

On 4 September, the director of the state-funded organisation “Ongudai Les,” Sergei Gonchar, demanded that district council deputy Arzhan Achimov write a letter of resignation. This was reported by local resident Ermen Badirov.

According to him, the decision was made after a call from the Ministry of Natural Resources—as punishment for Achimov voting against the local self-government reform in the Ongudai district (a region in the Altai Republic in southern Siberia).

On 3 September, at an extraordinary session, Achimov was the only deputy who did not support amendments to the district charter. The amendments entail a shift to a single-head management system and the abolition of rural settlements. Previously, on 22 August, four other deputies had also voted against, causing the changes not to be adopted at that time.

Arzhan Achimov works as a site manager at “Ongudai Les.” Since 2013, he had served as a village council deputy, and in 2023 he was elected to the district council as an independent candidate.

The municipal reform was approved by the deputies of the State Assembly of the Altai Republic on 24 June 2025. Following this, there were mass protests in the region. On 12 June, local residents blocked the Chuysky Trakt highway, and on 21 June, around two thousand people joined a rally in Gorno-Altaysk (the capital of the Altai Republic in southern Siberia).

Former staff member of the republic’s parliament, Dmitry Todoshyev, tried to challenge the reform in court, but on 18 August, the Supreme Court of the Altai Republic dismissed his lawsuit.