Uncertainty about dual ‘tsars’
With Russia about to experience “leadership” from two sources (Putin and Medvedev), some are predicting that the power sharing won’t last too long.
Russia is heading for a crisis if President Vladimir Putin and his successor, Dmitry Medvedev, try to share the country’s leadership, the leader of the biggest opposition party said on Tuesday.
Putin, whose presidency ends next month, has said he will serve as prime minister under his protege Medvedev. This will create a power-sharing arrangement unusual for a country accustomed to having a single, strong leader.
“I find it hard to imagine a Russia in which there are two tsars,” Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov told a news conference.
Russian history showed that when there was no clear leader, “feuds and serious disorder always began, so we need to understand how they are going to divide up power between them,” he said. “If they rule together it will not work out.”
Well you know what they say about trying to serve two masters. There very well may come a day when the Russian people have to pick a side.
April 9th, 2008 at 10:14 am
“Russia is heading for a crisis if President Vladimir Putin and his successor, Dmitry Medvedev, try to share the country’s leadership, the leader of the biggest opposition party said on Tuesday.”
This is a completely ridiculous statement. They are not ’sharing’ power. The Russian Constitution clearly lays out boundaries for each postion and they will be following this.
Wether, the new Prime Minister is a Former President or somebody wholly new, the responsibilities would be the same.
April 9th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
This entire article is written from the perspective of Putin’s enemies. And yet if we look at Putin’s ratings amongst the typical Russian, they are higher than any our Presidents in the USA have ever typically had. And I do not buy into the idea that the ratings are high because of the media control. People are individuals and can think for themselves, even in the midst of control- if that is what is happening which I do not believe it is. Every leader of a country has to manage opposition, and they have to understand free speech from slander and lies, and control that which is slander and lies.
Dmitry and Putin have continually stated that they will have clear boundaries in their roles. They consistently state and show through their actions that they actually care about Russian citizens, and that in fact their rule is about their citizens welfare and NOT about their own power. But the West can not seem to take this at face value. The West continually project their own values of power and status onto other countries, when in fact for many countries the central reason of exercise of leadership is not status and power, but on the welfare of every single citizen. Canada is a good example of this.
I guess it is healthy to have an edge of skepticism, and it is naive to trust where it is not warranted. But I choose to take people’s words and actions at face value unless proven to me otherwise that I should not. I do not have any proof that Putin is a malicious leader. The West wants us to believe that he ruthlessly orchestrated the deaths of various journalists, and yet these journalists had ties to organized crime. Why are we not exploring that? Also in the West we overrate these journalists actual influence and popularity in Russian society. I am not defending Russia. I know as well as anyone else that often things are not what they appear to be (this includes ugly pictures and well as pretty ones). People get falsely accused. Guilty men go free. But what I am suggesting is to bring balance to the picture. Present both sides, so people who read your articles that do not have time to do their own research will see that there is another entirely different way people are thinking about these issues.