"Kommersant": "HOW TO BECOME A GOVERNOR IN RUSSIA"
Background information
The first direct elections of regional leaders were held in Moscow, St Petersburg and Tatarstan on June 12, 1991, simultaneously with the first presidential elections. By that time, the Russian republics were granted the right to elect their Presidents.
On August 22, 1991, President Boris Yeltsin approved the law according to which heads of administration in regions, territories and autonomous areas were appointed by the Russian President by agreement with the local authorities.
In 1993, the Congress of People's Deputies ruled that gubernatorial elections could be held by presidential decision or if the local council passed a vote of no confidence on the appointed Governor. Yeltsin's policy of "taking as much sovereignty as one can carry" granted broad powers to the heads of constituent entities.
The law on basic guarantees of the Russian citizens' election rights, approved in December 1994, introduced elections of the heads of executive authority in the regions. In 1996, the Constitutional Court affirmed that the head of a constituent entity cannot be appointed by the local legislature but must be elected.
In May 2000, President Vladimir Putin started the battle against "the gubernatorial all-permissiveness". Subsequently, presidential representatives in federal districts were appointed to monitor the work of Governors, and the regional leaders lost the ability to influence the appointment of the local heads of law-enforcement and security agencies and lost their seats in the Federation Council.
On September 13, 2004, less than two weeks after the school hostage standoff in Beslan, North Ossetia, Mr Putin announced a new reform of state power, which stipulated the approval of the heads of Russian regions by local legislatures upon their nomination by the President. The law stipulating this was adopted in December 2004 and came into force in 2005.
Under the new procedure, the candidates were to be selected by the President's representatives in the federal districts, after which the chief of the Presidential Executive Office presented at least two candidates per seat to the President. At the same time, the Governors regained control of the heads of local law-enforcement and security agencies.
On April 25, 2005, Mr Putin said in his address to the Federal Assembly that one of the candidates to the post of governor presented to the President must be nominated by the party that won the regional parliamentary elections. The federal parliament approved the amendments in December 2005.
