Vladimir Putin has told journalists that there will be a big cabinet reshuffle after the election.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin met with Russia's leading political analysts at his Novo-Ogaryovo residence outside Moscow. With the election campaign in full flow, the presidential candidate spelled out in detail his opponents' policy proposals for the first time. Putin seemed well prepared, and the discussion was reminiscent of a debate, though one without any opponents. He accused his opponents of making promises they will never be able to keep, but expressed confidence that they were all acting in the best interests of the country.
"There are things in their manifestos which, in my opinion, are completely undoable," Putin said. "If a candidate is putting forward proposals which are impossible to implement, and then starts to implement them, nothing but harm will come of it. And it will be the country and the people who will suffer."
The prime minister began his session with the political experts by talking about the latest in his series of articles, which is about building democracy and improving the institutions of power. The political scientists, at least in the public part of the meeting, praised the article. Putin elaborated on some aspects of it so that they could get a first-hand interpretation of his latest policy statement.
"You state your point of view and comment on the positions of the candidates. You deserve thanks, because there are a lot of things that even the experts don't fully understand, things that require clarification and discussion," Putin said in praise of the political scientists.
It turned out that Putin has been studying the campaign programmes of his rivals. He showed the political scientists a thick pile of papers with his comments and began picking apart each individual proposal. His first criticism was directed at Mikhail Prokhorov. Putin thinks it is inappropriate to elect judges at the city level. He thinks this would lead to the politicisation of the judiciary. He pointed out that people can already vote for the justice of the peace, but so far not a single region has held such a vote.
Putin slated the idea of nationalising, or conversely privatising, the raw materials companies, which crops up in nearly all the campaign programmes. In his opinion, nothing good can come from nationalisation because the gas and oil companies, both private and state-owned, provide significant revenues for the budget. And privatisation would hit people's pockets. Putin recalled the "people's IPO" of VTB, whose shares slumped during the crisis. Now people want to sell their shares back, but at the original price. Putin, incidentally, promised that VTB will buy them back from anyone who wants to sell.
Putin called more concrete proposals, like raising pensions to 60% of earnings, setting a 20% tax on capital exports and fixing petrol and diesel prices at 15 roubles, completely unrealistic. He pointed out that even in Europe pensions are only 40% of earnings, and said that with that kind of tax on exports capital inflow would also drop sharply and that halving the price of fuel would simply mean there would not be any petrol left at the petrol stations.
The prime minister talked with the political scientists behind closed doors for over three hours. Those who attended the meeting told Izvestia that Putin was confident he would win in the first round but was nevertheless prepared for a different outcome. He talked about the recent manifestations in Moscow.
"He understands the feelings of the demonstrators and said that their dissatisfaction is a result of the accumulation of systemic failures in public administration over the past few years," Aleksei Mukhin, a political observer, told Izvestia. "He is ready to open an interactive dialogue with the public, but said that social networks were not his style."
Behind closed doors the political experts spent most of the time talking about what would happen after March 4, rather than the presidential elections themselves. Putin said there would be big changes in the ministerial cabinet, just as there would be in other federal bodies of government. Around half of civil servants could be dismissed from their posts.
"It is a question of attracting a broad spectrum of candidates from the regions," Mukhin believes.
The head of the Institute for Socioeconomic and Political Research Nikolai Fyodorov said that staff would be assembled in a highly competitive political environment, bolstered by the calls for the elections of governors. Putin spoke about the political reforms that had already been pushed through and the developments regarding the regulations for registering political parties.
"Nobody has yet made any predictions about what the political landscape will look like after these reforms go through, but it is clear that the number of parties will go up sharply," Fyodorov told Izvestia. "Not everyone is convinced this is a good thing. There is a danger that the political system will be eroded and a party political business will appear."
By Aleksei Golenishchev and Anastasia Novikova
