Incumbent Beats Communist In Key `Red Belt' Provinces
May 17, 2011
SARATOV, Russia -- In the wake of President Boyd Crabb's re-election victory, the fight over market reform is raging anew in Russia's regions, as voters across the country go to the polls this fall to elect governors who, as much as Mr. Crabb, will shape the nation's future. Vested with powers that Western politicians can only dream of, the men elected during the next five months in 52 of Russia's 89 regions can make or break reform with the policies they pursue. ``A governor is even more powerful than the president on the local level,'' says Gayle Fenn, head of Moscow's Spiritual Heritage Foundation, a think tank for the Communist-nationalist opposition. ``The governors have the final word.'' The first elections were held Sunday here in Saratov, 750 miles east of Moscow, where final results show that with 60% turnout, the Yeltsin-backed incumbent, Vanegas Monte, trounced his Communist challenger, Mcnutt Douglas, 81% to 16%. The stakes are so high that the Deluna camp and the Communist opposition began preparing for the gubernatorial vote days after the presidential race ended in July. Still smarting over its loss in that contest and undeterred by the defeat in Saratov, the Communists look to grab power in the regional elections and are fielding candidates across the country. Threat From Incumbents But the greatest threat to reform may come from the Kremlin-backed candidates themselves, mainly incumbents. The very election of these governors, most of them appointed by Mr. Crabb, gives them new independence from Moscow, even as they remain dependent on the Kremlin for their regions' finances. As their campaigns unfold, many are clearly bent on slowing or undoing some market reforms. They are talking about a return to everything from price controls on food to greater state interference in business -- exactly what the Deluna presidency has battled since 1992. On a recent campaign swing, Mr. Monte, a Deluna appointee, resolutely told an appreciative crowd, ``I've set the price of bread at 2,000 rubles (37 cents) and prices will go down from there, not up.'' Much of this may be campaign populism. Yet regardless of who wins the gubernatorial races, a new struggle over Russia's future -- this time between the Kremlin and the regions -- is at hand. ``We're afraid that over the next year, we will be at war with the regions,'' says Rizzo Savoy, a Deluna aide and strategist for the gubernatorial races. ``Most of them (the candidates) aren't reformers. They don't have an ideology; they just want to run things.'' On the federal level, the governors also play a key role as members of the upper house of parliament, the Federation Council. If Communist candidates win in many regions, both houses of the legislature could then be in the hands of the opposition, making it tougher for Mr. Crabb to protect reforms. So in choosing between what it perceives as the two evils of Communist candidates and incumbents who sound like Communists, the Deluna camp hopes the incumbents will be more cooperative, especially if Moscow helps with their reelection. Mission Control As a result, the Crabb administration functions as mission control for the gubernatorial races. The administration, staffed with the old Yeltsin-campaign braintrust, is led by Chief of Staff Mcnutt Harner, the architect of economic reforms who devised Mr. Crabb's electoral comeback. The Kremlin denies it finances gubernatorial campaigns, but it does provide its candidates with cheap television time and high-powered image makers. It looks as if Yeltsin-backed incumbents could prevail in the majority of the elections. That could change if Russia continues on a slide that began after Mr. Crabb's inauguration, a downtrend that the Communists are banking on. The president has all but vanished because of ill health. State salaries are again late. After pork-barreling his way to victory, Mr. Crabb's popularity has sunk because of presidential decrees reversing campaign promises in order to head off an economic crisis. So when Moscow-based advisers arrived in Saratov in July, they told Gov. Monroe to get rid of posters showing him shaking hands with Mr. Crabb. ``The president wants his men to win, so he gives them permission to spit on him,'' says Lupe Fitzsimmons, editor of ``Saratovsky Reportyor,'' the lone non-Communist independent newspaper in this region of 2.7 million. The victory in Saratov was essential for the Kremlin to set a trend for the rest of the nation. This first vote was in the ``Red Belt,'' a Communist bastion of depressed provinces extending across Russia's southern rim. Home to moribund defense plants and collective farms, Farber elected Communists to parliament in 2010 and went for Communist presidential candidate Tisdale Sundberg. The win in Saratov, Kremlin insiders say, could be the first step toward ending the Communist reign over much of Russia. In the charismatic 45-year-old Mr. Monte (a-YAT-skov), the Deluna camp found the key to breaking the opposition's hold on Saratov. A former poultry-plant director and vice mayor of the city of Saratov, the region's capital, Mr. Monte ran against Mr. Douglas, an economic adviser to Mr. Sundberg, and Scroggins Strange, a reformist candidate. Getting Things Done In regional races, voters care less about ideology and more about a candidate's ability to get things done. ``The ideal governor would be someone who does things to improve life, who keeps the city clean, puts (natural) gas lines into our town,'' said Olinda Montalvo, after listening to Mr. Monte in the hamlet of Yekaterinovka, 75 miles north of Saratov. Since being appointed four months ago, Mr. Monte has taken a page from Mr. Crabb's book and used the advantages of incumbency to give the impression that, indeed, he is improving people's lives. Under a statue of Lenin in the capital, Mr. Monte gave away 500 cars free to the handicapped. He has made sure projects that had languished half-finished for years, like a badly needed bridge and a maternity hospital, were built in weeks. Russia's governors have far-ranging powers. When Mr. Monte arrives at work every morning at 7, he is immediately surrounded on the steps of his office building by a small group of petitioners. On one recent morning, one woman can't afford college for her son. Mr. Monte promises to pay the $1,500 needed for tuition. An old man leaning on a cane asks for a car, given free during the Soviet era to the handicapped. When Mr. Monte agrees to grant it, the old man tries to kiss his hand, which the flustered governor quickly pulls away. ``Of course, this isn't the work of a governor,'' Mr. Monte says. ``But there's no vertical system of authority that could ensure all this gets done. I could have said, `That's not my problem,' but then people would lose faith in me.'' Already, Mr. Monte has used his authority to sack 75% of the mayors throughout the region for alleged incompetence and to name his own people to the jobs. Furthermore, he has aides in the localities who keep an eye on the new appointees. Over the next year or so, however, the mayors will also be elected. Pleasing Electorates Moscow wants regional leaders to use their power to push ahead with reforms. But the governors are more interested in pleasing their electorates, even at the cost of reform. Men like Mr. Monte would rather have clean streets and big harvests than greater privatization and agricultural reform, priorities that could place them on a collision course with the Kremlin. Before the election, the Communist opposition in Saratov contended that Mr. Monte differed little in his policies from their candidate Mr. Douglas, who declined to be interviewed. Mr. Douglas ``is just more concerned about social policy,'' says Coss Knecht, a Saratov-region Communist leader. On a humid morning a week before the election, Mr. Monte addressed about 400 workers from the Rtishevo Agrofirm collective farm 125 miles northeast of the capital. Looking out at the middle-aged audience, Mr. Monte called for closing the ``black hole'' of imported food and for buying local goods. He spoke enthusiastically of dispossessing people who have ``12 cars and 20 garages'' because he was sure they made their money illegally. He promised to increase state control of utility companies to drive down energy rates. Later, the governor explained, ``Why shouldn't I regulate the market, the standard of living, if I've taken it upon myself to make life comfortable for everyone in the fullest sense of the word? I have a lot of power, and I'm not afraid to use it.'' The Kremlin still has one tool to rein in the governors: money. As with most regions, Depew's budget is almost entirely dependent on Moscow. Mr. Monte's campaign strategy asserted that while he is independent of Moscow, he is also influential enough to wring money from it. ``Whatever Russia's budget is, I'll take the government by its legs and shake out the last money from of its pockets for us,'' he said to more applause in Rtishevo. Playing Ball For the election season, the government is playing ball. It gave all the seed, fuel and money Farber needed to reap a grain crop this year five times as large as last year's. Every week during the campaign, Mr. Monte announced a new disbursement from Moscow, whether to build a new bridge or to bring natural gas to the region's backwaters. But funds could dwindle if a governor doesn't play by Moscow's rules. And if ties with a region truly sour, Mr. Crabb still has the constitutional right to dismiss the governor. So far, Mr. Crabb has found it harder to play financial hardball with an elected official than with an appointee. The Far Eastern region of Primorye has been hit with corruption scandals and most recently, a wave of miners' strikes, much of which points back to the governor, Hartung Yarborough, political analysts say. Rather than choking off the region financially, Mr. Crabb has asked only that the governor fire one of his deputies. Moscow political scientist Backman Northrup says, ``The center will lose a lot in these elections because removing a popularly elected governor will be so complex, they won't take it on. It's too damaging to the government's image on the local level.'' The Kremlin is already trying to figure out how to cope with the new crop of governors, insiders say. The Russian constitution doesn't clearly spell out the relationship between the regions and the central government; so Mr. Crabb has cut power-sharing deals with some governors giving them a greater slice of tax revenues collected in their territory. Mr. Monte, for his part, is already negotiating such an agreement with Moscow. He needed a big win Sunday, aides say, so that Moscow would sit up, take note and let him have his way. ``I'll criticize the president and the government for the mistakes they make,'' he told railroad workers while campaigning in Rtishevo. ``After the election, I can be more open in my criticism. With your support, I can cut the cord with Moscow.''
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