'We are jealous of your freedom in South Africa'

President Vladimir Putin was watching the second half of the 2018 World Cup final from a VIP box in Moscow’s Luzhniki Stadium when three women in police uniform burst on to the field – stopping play during one of the most-watched sporting events on earth. They were promptly arrested, and would spend the next fortnight behind bars.

But for Olga Pakhtusova, Veronika Nikulshina and Olga Kurachyova, that’s what you call a successful protest action – designed to draw the attention of the world to human rights abuses and police brutality in Russia.

“During the World Cup, Russian policemen behaved rather okay,” Kurachyova says now.

“They were rather polite and good, and a lot of international media reported like everything was great in Russia. But we knew that it was going to get worse after the World Cup. So we decided to use the final to remind the world about problems in Russia.”

The three women are prominent members of the Russian feminist protest collective Pussy Riot: a group which has been a thorn in the side of the Russian government since its launch seven years ago.

Originally a punk rock outfit who came to global attention in 2012 after performing an anti-Putin protest song in a Moscow cathedral while wearing balaclavas – a stunt which earned the singers almost two years in a labour camp – Pussy Riot now prefers the term “open action collective”.

But their targets have not changed. Vladimir Putin remains in their sights, as does the increasing authoritarianism of the Russian government towards personal and social freedom. To be an activist in Russia in 2018, they say, means readying yourself to be arrested at any point.

Nikulshina says that when she wakes up in the morning, she asks herself: “Where am I going to spend the night today? Home, or police station?”

This is one of the reasons why Pussy Riot is full of praise for South Africa.

“There are many things in common between Russia and South Africa, but the one thing we don’t have in common: here in South Africa there is really working freedom of speech, working NGOs, and so on,” says Kurachyova. “In Russia we don’t have such things.”

Adds Nikulshina: “So we are jealous.”

Pakhtusova chips in: “We really think you guys have wonderful hope for a better future than us.”

The three women have been in Cape Town for a fortnight, working on a collaboration with Italian artist Marinella Senatore. Don’t expect them to tell you about it, though: they never discuss their plans in advance.

It’s a matter of necessity that much of Pussy Riot’s activities take place in secrecy, because the threats that members face are not hypothetical. In September, group member Pyotr Verzilov was hospitalised after apparent poisoning – a well-documented technique of Russian authorities when dealing with political liabilities.

“I took him to hospital. We don’t know the substance, but it’s something like military poisoning,” says Nikulshina. “It’s pretty clear it was a gesture.”

The three women are strikingly matter-of-fact when discussing this. To Pussy Riot’s young members, the oppression faced by political dissidents in Russia is simply the norm.

Asked by Daily Maverick what they think life after Putin could be like, the three women look at each other as if this idea is almost inconceivable.

“I’m 21. All my life was under Putin control,” Nikulshina explains. “I cannot imagine a life after Putin… It would be better.”

Pussy Riot is aware that the South African government enjoys a very warm relationship with Putin’s administration. It’s not something they recommend.

Putin, says Pakhtusova drily, is “not the best person to have a friendship with”.

Nikulshina says that the cordial Russia-South African rapport does not surprise her – because, by the sound of things, former president Jacob Zuma and Vladmiri Putin have many shared interests.

“Like corruption and stuff,” she suggests, deadpan. “It’s what makes people close to each other.”

Pussy Riot may be enemies of the state in Russia, and some ordinary Russians also grouse at the group’s provocative stunts as pandering to Western media and making life harder for other human rights activists on the ground. But the group’s reputation as freedom fighters has now spread globally, to the extent that its members are deluged with invitations from around the world. Before South Africa, the three women spent time in Hong Kong working with activists fighting for autonomy from China.

Pussy Riot believes that its brand of activism, mixing performance art with political protest, is highly effective at drawing attention to governmental crackdown on dissent.

“The main goal of our art is to highlight things that are hidden in the shadows,” says Nikulshina.

On that note, Pakhtusova has some advice for South Africans.

“We noticed that, surprisingly, you guys don’t have as much street art as you could have,” she told Daily Maverick.

“So we really think you should go to the streets and make the streets yours. Fight for your rights using art.” DM