As a bill extending Russia’s presidency from four to six years barreled through the Russian legislature on Friday, it fell to the old-timers from the Communist Party to put up a fight.
“Why do we have to do this today?” said Viktor I. Ilyukhin, a Communist legislator, during discussions today in the State Duma, the lower house of Parliament. “Why are we in such a hurry? A strict authoritarian regime has already been established in this country. There is already an unprecedented concentration of power in one person’s hands.”
Political opposition leaders have been harshly critical of the proposed change, which is almost assured of becoming law, but opposition parties have little presence in the Duma, and on Friday, the Communists were virtually the only dissenters.
In the end, the bill sailed through its first reading in the Duma, passing by a vote of 388 to 58. Fifty-seven of those votes were from Communists, who opposed the change unanimously. The measure must pass two more readings in the lower house, and also be approved by a majority in the upper house and Russia’s regional parliaments.
Russians were taken by surprise last week when their new president, Dmitri A. Medvedev proposed the term extension, the first substantial amendment to Russia’s Constitution since it was adopted in 1993. The longer presidential term would only apply to Mr. Medvedev if he is re-elected, and speculation abounded that he was paving the way for his powerful predecessor, Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin, to return to the presidency — perhaps before Mr. Medvedev’s four years are up.
In an interview with the French newspaper Figaro this week, Mr. Medvedev was asked whether he might leave office before 2012.
“I am in the process of working right now,” Mr. Medvedev answered. “Why are you pushing me into certain decisions? I can say only one thing for sure, and that is that the new terms will benefit only whoever is elected to the office of the president once the necessary amendments have entered into force.”
Mr. Putin, still Russia’s most popular politician, said he supported the change, and that it had “no personality dimension.”
“As regards who may run for the next term and when they may do so, it is too early to speak of this,” he said, according to the Interfax news agency.
Mr. Putin stepped down from the presidency because the Constitution barred him from seeking a third consecutive term. He said last year that he could not in good conscience change the Constitution — but also that the four-year term was too short.
“It seems to me that in today’s Russia, five, six or seven years would be acceptable,” he said in an interview last June.
The Communists argued that point on Friday in their own idiosyncratic way. The party’s president, Gennadi A. Zyuganov, scoffed at the idea that four years was a short period, noting that Soviet five-year plans had produced the Magnitogorsk and Kuznetsky metallurgical plants, the Gorky automotive factory, and the Stalingrad tractor factory.
Others from his delegation resorted to sarcasm.
“Why are you so convinced that President Medvedev is the wisest and cleverest person in our country?” said one deputy, Nikolai M. Kharitonov, during discussion before the vote. “For the sake of decency, at least, these innovative ideas have to be discussed at a lower level.”
“Why are you insisting on six years?” he finished. “Why not 15?”
No comments:
Post a Comment