New Russian Premier is Main Candidate for Presidency – Expert

The new Russian prime minister, Viktor Zubkov, is likely to be the main presidential candidate in the March 2008 elections, according to the president of the Centre for Political Studies, Konstantin Simonov.

Interviewed on the “At first hand” programme on Russian Radio, Simonov said: “I am inclined to believe that Zubkov is likely to be the main candidate to succeed [Putin]. Therefore when they say that Putin has not made up his mind yet, this seems strange to me. If Putin indeed ‘has not made up his mind yet’ and regards Zubkov as a transitional figure whom he will later replace by someone else, then I am completely at a loss as to why he decided to make him prime minister and remove [outgoing Prime Minister Mikhail] Fradkov. I can see no sense whatsoever in this manoeuvre because we all perfectly realize that no major changes are likely to take place in our economic policy in the next six months.”

He added: “We don’t know Zubkov’s programme for a very simple reason – essentially, it does not exist. We also realize that the current situation is rather favourable for Russia, so one would really have to try hard to destroy the economy in these conditions.”

According to Simonov, when late Russian President Boris Yeltsin nominated Vladimir Putin for the post of prime minister, Yeltsin’s popularity rating was about 3 per cent. “Putin’s [popularity rating] is now more than 60 per cent. It would be much easier for Putin to explain his choice. And it would be much easier for him to conduct this campaign. I think six months is exactly the time needed to introduce Zubkov to the country.”

Originally published by Radio Russia, Moscow, in Russian 0830 13 Sep 07.

(c) 2007 BBC Monitoring Former Soviet Union. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.