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Russian President Dissolves Government

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Russian President Dissolves Government
By VOA News
12 September 2007

Russian President Vladimir Putin has dissolved the government.

Russian officials and news reports say Mr. Putin dismissed the government Wednesday after Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov offered his resignation.

The reports say Mr. Fradkov decided to urge Mr. Putin to dissolve the government because of upcoming major political events, and a desire to give the president the full freedom to make decisions about staff.

Russia is set to hold parliamentary elections in December. Presidential elections are to be held three months

VOA News - Russian President Dissolves Government

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Russia's President Advances Unexpected Choice for Prime Minister
By Peter Fedynsky
Moscow
12 September 2007

Fedynsky report (mp3) - Download 700k audio clip
Listen to Fedynsky report (mp3) audio clip

Russian President Vladimir Putin has accepted the resignation of the entire Russian government, raising speculation that an unexpected choice for new prime minister could also become Mr. Putin's successor in the Kremlin. VOA Moscow Correspondent Peter Fedynsky reports.

Word of Mr. Putin's nominee to become Russia's new prime minister came from Boris Gryzlov, speaker of Russia's lower house of parliament, or State Duma.

Gryzlov says the president of the Russian Federation has sent the name of Viktor Zubkov for consideration by the State Duma as the new head of government. He is now head of Federal Financial Monitoring Service.

In that capacity, Zubkov, who is little known by the public, has investigated financial crimes in Russia. Gryzlov notes that the nominee was also a collective farm director and Communist Party official in the Leningrad region.

Leningrad, Mr. Putin's hometown, is now known by its pre-Soviet name, Saint Petersburg.

Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov offered his resignation to President Putin in a face-to-face meeting broadcast on national television. Mr. Putin promptly accepted Mr. Fradkov's offer, praising him for growing the economy, raising salaries, and lowering inflation.

Mr. Fradkov said he and the entire Cabinet are stepping down to give the Kremlin leader freedom to pursue necessary decisions before upcoming Russian parliamentary and presidential elections. Those decisions, he said, include freedom to staff a new government.

President Putin's response suggests the new prime minister could also assume the presidency.

The Russian leader says, "Perhaps together, we should all think how to structure the government and leadership so that it better corresponds to the pre-election period and prepares the country for the period after the parliamentary and presidential elections"

Mr. Putin's spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, told the VOA the resignation did not come as a surprise.

The resignation of any government can always be expected, says Mr. Peskov. Sooner or later it happens.

Russian political analysts have long considered Sergei Ivanov and Dmitri Medvedev, both first deputy prime ministers, as favorites for the prime minister's position.

But Andrei Kortunov, head of the Eurasia Foundation in Moscow, says Mr. Putin has been a master of surprise decisions. Kortunov says Zubkov would be, what he calls, a technical president who could leave the door open for Mr. Putin's eventual return as Kremlin leader.

Zubkov, says Kortunov, does not have his own power base, he is about 66 years old, has no personal political ambitions and Putin knows him personally from the St. Petersburg mayor's office. So, according to Kortunov, there is logic to the choice.

The Russian constitution prohibits its president from serving more than two consecutive terms in office. This forces Mr. Putin to step down next year, but he may run again in 2012. Russia holds its next presidential election in March.

VOA News - Russia's President Advances Unexpected Choice for Prime Minister

Okay, I'm not going to lie, I haven't been following the news very well lately. But can someone explain to me why an entire government would "step down" even if it is for a new election? Maybe I'm missing some crucial information?

As I recall, under the Russian constitution, if the president wants to replace a minister, he has to dismiss the entire cabinet, assign portfolios again (making the changes that prompted the whole thing), and then submit that new cabinet to the Duma for approval.

Yeah, the Russian presidential ability to dissolve is a pretty common check/tool in the Constitution. It grew pretty violent once (Yeltsin), but it's a power the President has in his pocket. He can dissolve the government as well as the Duma if I'm remembering it right.

For example, if the Duma is really hindering Prime Minister replacements (reject three nominations from the President), he can dissolve the Duma simply due to the fact that they're slowing the whole thing down and this causes some parts of the government to come to a grinding halt. I don't see this as bizarre or anything of the sort; figured this was just how Russian politics worked. It's a cleaning house sort of procedure of sorts from what I thought.

Yeah. It's not as psychotic as it may seem on its face. The Russian president just has that much power, naturally.

The Duma, is it comparable to congress or another legislative unit?

And if the president can dissolve the Duma for hindering Prime minister replacement, why does he need to get their approval on a new cabinet? Is it just an example of separation of powers?

AND if all that is true, and the president has so much power, it seems like it would be a dictatorship in disguise of a democracy, no?

The Duma is the lower house of the Russian parliament, and is roughly equivalent to the House of Representatives, or, more specifically, the lower houses of most European parliaments.

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And if the president can dissolve the Duma for hindering Prime minister replacement, why does he need to get their approval on a new cabinet? Is it just an example of separation of powers?

The president needs the Duma's approval of a new cabinet because the Russian constitution says so. And, generally in parliamentary, when governments are unable to formed, the head of state can dissolve parliament and call for new elections.

This hasn't happened here, though; the cabinet was dismissed, not the parliament, and the cabinet was dismissed because the constitution requires that for changes to be made in its composition. There was to be a change at prime minister for whatever reason, and to accomplish it the entire government had to be dismissed. It was also unlikely to have happened, since parliament is dominated by the United Russia party, which supports Putin, and will confirm whoever he appoints.

What I don't understand is why everyone else seems to think this is an example of the great power of the Russian presidency; making the entire cabinet resign when he wants to make changes is actually a check on his ability to appoint ministers as he chooses. The U.S. President doesn't need to fire his entire cabinet in order to pick a new Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, and European prime ministers can shuffle ministerial assignments around essentially as they choose.