Regional Bosses Give Initial O.K. To Putin Move
ST PETERSBURG, May 16, 2000 -- (Reuters <http://www.reuters.com>) Russia's
regional bosses broadly welcomed on Monday President Vladimir Putin's bid
to reorganize local structures, but analysts said that could change if
their powers and authority came under threat.
Putin's plan, approved by a weekend decree, appoints Kremlin
representatives to seven new, large administrative areas with a mandate to
oversee the activity of 89 regions spread throughout the world's largest
country.
The representatives' powers have yet to be spelled out, though one member
of parliament suggested these could include sacking uncooperative regional
leaders.
For the moment, the decree has left untouched Russia's elected regional
governors, who in nine years of post-Soviet rule have carved out power
bases locally and in the upper house of parliament.
The decree followed Putin's suspension last week of legislation passed by
regions deemed to be in contradiction with Russian federal law - including
Ingushetia, next to separatist Chechnya, Bashkortostan in central Russia
and the Amur region next to the Chinese border. "I am very pleased with the
decree," Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, loosely allied with Putin after
opposing him in last year's parliamentary election, told NTV television.
"It is very important to provide these officials with serious powers and
keep governors' problems to a minimum in dealing with the government."
Vladimir Yakovlev, re-elected governor of St Petersburg, Russia's second
city, on Sunday, said he had spoken to Putin about the move and concluded
that local and federal bodies could work together.
Also in agreement was Mintimer Shaimiyev, head of Tatarstan, an oil-rich
central Russian region which enjoys broad autonomy. "I do not see anything
wrong in this and am not inclined to dramatize the situation," he told
Interfax news agency.
GOVERNORS COULD STILL TURN AGAINST CHANGES
But Sergei Isayev, director of St Petersburg's Sociology Research Center,
said governors could turn against major change.
"The reason governors have gone along with Putin's changes is because it is
so far a mere piece of paper with little obvious effect on them," Isayev
said by telephone.
"The minute they see their powers threatened the reaction will probably be
quite different. The regional leaders have already proved they can put up
considerable resistance," he said, referring to the chamber's repeated
refusal last year to bow to Kremlin demands to sack the country's
prosecutor general.
There were some dissenting voices among regional heads.
The president of Ingushetia, Ruslan Aushev, who had one of his region's
laws struck down last week, was quoted as saying the decree was only a
first step to major changes.
He echoed comments in some Russian media in recent weeks that the Kremlin's
overall plan could involve changes to the constitution and, ultimately, the
dispatch to the regions of "governor-generals" appointed by Moscow.
Kremlin sources, quoted by Interfax, said the current measure sought merely
to improve communication and raise the quality of officials representing
Moscow's interests.
KREMLIN TALKS ON FURTHER CHANGES
Other sources said the Kremlin was holding talks with governors and
political parties on changing the composition of the Federation Council
upper house, where governors are now given an automatic seat. That would
take serious aim at the privileges of governors, who see the chamber as a
power base.
For Lilia Shevtsova of the Carnegie Endowment think tank, the provisions
were sufficient to show that Putin's previously vague intentions on power
and politics had now become clear.
"He is not a mystery any more. He has come to the Kremlin as a stabilizer
and centralizes," she told a conference in Moscow. "He wants to make
executive power the supreme power, he wants to reassert Moscow's control
over regions. He has a chance to curb the arrogance of regional barons."
The Moscow daily Vedomosti said governors viewed Putin's decree as a "trial
balloon". It predicted the president would alter the Federation Council and
abandon the practice of agreeing with governors on appointing federal
officials in the regions.
"This will leave the governors with no illusions. Moscow will have created
a parallel power structure strictly accountable to the center of
authority," it said. "And as everyone knows, when you have two currencies
running alongside each other it is always the weaker one that gives way
