Postwar History
However, during the late 1940s and 1950s, the entire political and cultural elite of Leningrad suffered from more harsh repressions under dictatorship of Stalin, hundreds were executed and thousands were imprisoned in repressions known as the Leningrad Affair. Independent thinkers, writers, artists and other intellectuals were attacked, magazines "Zvezda" and "Leningrad" were banned, Akhmatova and Zoshchenko were repressed, and tens of thousands Leningraders were exiled to Siberia. More crackdowns on the Leningrad's intellectual elite, known as the "Second Leningrad affair", were part of unfair economic policies of the Soviet state. Leningrad's economy was producing about 6% of the USSR GNP, having less than 2% of the country's population, but such economic efficiency was negated by the Soviet Communist Party which diverted the earned income from people of Leningrad to other Soviet places and programs. As a result during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, the city of Leningrad was seriously underfunded in favor of Moscow. Leningrad suffered from the unfair distribution of wealth, because the Soviet leadership drained the city's resources to subsidise higher standards of living in Moscow and some underperforming parts of the Soviet Union and beyond. Such unfair redistribution of wealth caused struggle within the Soviet government and communist party, which lead to their fragmentation and played a role in the eventual collapse of the USSR.
On 12 June 1991, the day of the first Russian presidential election, in a referendum 54% of voters chose to restore "the original name, Saint Petersburg, on 6 September 1991. In the same election Anatoly Sobchak became the first democratically elected mayor of the city. Among the first initiatives of Sobchak was his efforts to minimise the federal control by Moscow to keep the income from St. Petersburg's economy in the city.
Original names returned to 39 streets, six bridges, three Saint Petersburg Metro stations and six parks. Older people sometimes use old names and old mailing addresses. The name Leningrad was heavily promoted in media, mainly in connection with the siege, so even authorities may call it "Hero city Leningrad." Young people may use Leningrad as a vague protest against some social and economic changes. A popular ska punk band from Saint Petersburg is called Leningrad.
Leningrad Oblast retained its name after a popular vote. It is a separate federal subject of Russia of which the city of St. Petersburg is the capital.
In 1996, Vladimir Yakovlev was elected the head of the Saint Petersburg City Administration, and changed his title from "mayor" to "governor." In 2003, Yakovlev resigned a year before his second term expired. Valentina Matviyenko was elected governor. In 2006 she was reapproved as governor by the city legislature.
The Constitutional Court of Russia is scheduled to move to the former Senate and Synod buildings at the Decembrists Square in St. Petersburg by 2008. The move will partially restore Saint Petersburg's historic status, making the city the second judicial capital.
Read more about this topic: History Of Saint Petersburg
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