MOSCOW (AP) – Taking a page from Donald Trump, Chechnya’s authoritarian leader Ramzan Kadyrov has taken to reality TV to find an assistant.
Russian state television Rossiya on Wednesday broadcast the first episode of “The Team” – modeled on Trump’s “The Apprentice” – in which 16 contestants are competing to become an assistant to the Chechen strongman.
In his first task for the contestants, Kadyrov “allocated” 3,000 people, mostly women wearing headscarves, to each team with the challenge of organizing them to depict the name of their team at a soccer arena.
Kadyrov, who is a close ally of President Vladimir Putin, won re-election as Chechnya’s leader last month with almost 98 percent of the vote. Kadyrov has been repeatedly accused of human rights violations including murders and forced disappearances.