Just a little background to illustrate why Putin's decision to appoint governors should be understood in a much different light than it is being portrayed in American crap journalism.
Russia Profile www.russiaprofile.org October 15, 2004 Endgame on the Steppes? Putin's Proposals Could Affect the Authoritarian President of Kalmykia By Alexander Osipovich
President Vladimir Putin's proposal to appoint regional governors has drawn heavy criticism from both Western and Russian political analysts, who have slammed it for undermining Russia's nascent democracy. Amid this chorus, one of the few arguments voiced in favor of the proposal has been that it could help curb corruption in some regions. According to this argument, there are some regional leaders who are so corrupt and entrenched in power that they will never go away voluntarily. If the president had the ability to fire them, goes the argument, the regional leaders would behave themselves - or else face removal from office.
In the current political landscape, one of the prime candidates for removal might be Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. As president of Kalmykia, an autonomous republic in the southern steppes of Russia, Ilyumzhinov enjoys a luxurious, flamboyant lifestyle while his people live in poverty. The average wage in Kalmykia is $150 a month - well below the Russian average - and drinking water has to be imported by truck from neighboring regions. Rural parts of Kalmykia are being depopulated as collective farms crumble and residents flee in search of work. Yet "Kirsan," as he is widely known, seems to flaunt his wealth. He has a penchant for driving Rolls-Royces and in 1996 he declared an income of $1 million, more than any other Russian politician. Not surprisingly, his opponents accuse him of rampant corruption.
They have had little luck, however, communicating their views to the Kalmyk people. The republic's main opposition newspaper, Sovetskaya Kalmykia, has been driven underground. It is printed near Volgograd and its editor-in-chief, Larisa Yudina, was murdered in 1998. The man convicted of her murder was a former aide to Ilyumzhinov. During elections, opposition parties have reported widespread ballot stuffing and the misuse of so-called "administrative resources." Ilyumzhinov's authoritarianism has even led the normally squabbling factions of Russia's opposition - including Yabloko, SPS and the Communists - to combine their voices in protest.
Outside of Russia, Ilyumzhinov is perhaps best known for being president of FIDE, the world chess federation. Chess is an obsession of Ilyumzhinov's. In 1998, he arranged to have the World Chess Olympiad held in Elista, Kalmykia's capital. To host the competition, he built a lavish, Western-style housing complex called Chess City. Although it might seem like a strange priority in one of Russia's poorest regions, Ilyumzhinov seems determined to push chess on the Kalmyk people. Billboards throughout Elista proclaim, "Elista is the capital of chess!" along with a portrait of the republic's 42-year-old president. Yet Ilyumzhinov is controversial in the chess world. Instead of seeking corporate sponsors for FIDE, he has courted then international pariah leaders like Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
An obsession with chess, however, is not the strangest of Ilyumzhinov's eccentricities. The president of Kalmykia has told journalists that he has telepathic powers. He also claims that he has met aliens. "I have been on a UFO," he said in 2001. "The extraterrestrials put a yellow space suit on me. They gave me a tour of the spaceship and showed me the command center. I felt very comfortable with them."
A Pivotal Moment
While Ilyumzhinov may feel comfortable with aliens, an increasing number of his people are feeling uncomfortable with him. Recent months have seen growing tension in Kalmykia. The tension boiled over on Sept. 21, when a crowd of over 2,000 protestors gathered on the central square of Elista to demand Ilyumzhinov's resignation.
"Kalmykia is on the brink, and that's why people came out," said opposition activist Natalya Mandzhiyeva. "It's not because someone made them do it. It's because they wanted to do it themselves. It's because we have a totalitarian regime and it's impossible to live here."
The Sept. 21 protest ended in violence. In a crackdown that was widely broadcast on Russian television, police and OMON units dispersed the crowd, in some cases beating people and dragging them away by their hair. Over 150 protestors were detained. The republic's prosecutor general, Sergei Khlopushin, later claimed that the crowd had been drunk and unruly. But Mandzhiyeva said that the demonstrators, who included women and the elderly, had been nonviolent. Moreover, she added, many of the injured demonstrators were unable to get medical treatment in Kalmykia's hospitals, since doctors were ordered not to treat them.
"There isn't a single governor, or leader of an autonomous republic, who would deal so mercilessly with his people," said journalist Nikolai Mandzhiyev (who is no relation to Mandzhiyeva).
With Ilyumzhinov's tight grip on power, the beleaguered opposition has little hope of changing the current regime - unless it gets help from a powerful friend. For many members of the opposition, this friend is the federal government. Mandzhiyev, for example, would welcome Moscow's help in getting rid of Ilyumzhinov. "Personally, I would consent to it if Putin removed him and appointed someone else," he said.
Others doubt that Moscow would ever oust Ilyumzhinov. Batyr, an employee of the regional oil company Kalmneft who declined to give his last name, says that many federal officials are complicit in Ilyumzhinov's corruption and have little interest in removing him. Moreover, he argues that the republic's president is already under Kremlin control. "If he ever takes any actions that go against Moscow, he'll immediately find himself under prosecution," said Batyr. "Ilyumzhinov might be rich. He might be famous. But he's a puppet."
Still, in the aftermath of the crackdown on the Sept. 21 demonstration, Mandzhiyeva pins all her hopes on the federal government. "Someday this has to change," she said. "The federal authorities will figure things out. If they don't figure things out, then I don't know how we'll go on living."
What Will Putin Do?
The federal government has given mixed signals about Ilyumzhinov. On the one hand, Ilyumzhinov received a strong statement of support from Dmitry Kozak, the newly appointed presidential envoy to the Southern Federal District, in which Kalmykia is located, shortly after the demonstrations. "Mass street protests violating the law will not be tolerated," said Kozak. "There are no grounds for considering the acting president of Kalmykia as not legitimately elected."
On the other hand, both the demonstrations and the brutal police response were shown on state-controlled television, further damaging Ilyumzhinov's already shaky reputation. Some reports in the press suspected a Kremlin intrigue to undermine Ilyumzhinov.
Now, with the proposal to appoint regional leaders from Moscow (which is widely expected to pass in the State Duma), the future of Ilyumzhinov's career could rest with a decision by President Putin. Ilyumzhinov has already taken steps to please his new boss - like many regional leaders, he has endorsed the president's proposal, although it clearly weakens his ability to stay in power.
Experts disagree about what Putin will do in Kalmykia. The republic has some strategic importance, since it lies close to the turbulent North Caucasus and because it contains substantial oil reserves in its portion of the Caspian shelf.
"I think that with the new system of appointing leaders of the subjects of the Russian Federation, Putin will not leave [Ilyumzhinov] in charge of Kalmykia," said Sergei Mitrokhin, a leader of the liberal Yabloko party, in the daily newspaper Kommersant. "Ilyumzhinov is too odious a figure and he doesn't bring stability to Kalmykia. Part of Kalmykia's political elite understands this, and it is using the radical opposition to unseat Ilyumzhinov."
Alexei Titkov of the Moscow Carnegie Center agrees that part of Kalmykia's political elite has turned against Ilyumzhinov. But otherwise, he disagrees with Mi-trokhin. "The federal authorities have no particular reason to support the opposition and oust Ilyumzhinov," he said. "In my opinion, they have much more control over Kalmykia's regional government than they did in the past... The main task for Ilyumzhinov will be to demonstrate to the federal authorities that he can keep his republic under control."
In either case, the future of Kalmykia will be decided not in Elista, but in Moscow.
===== Nu, zayats, pogodi!
_______________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Declare Yourself - Register online to vote today! http://vote.yahoo.com