MeMyselfAndI
Jul 13th 2010, 01:44 PM
Long-serving Bashkir president positioned for the axe
Murtaza Rakhimov, president of the Ural republic of Bashkortistan, is said to be close to leaving office after tense negotiations with United Russia chiefs.
Rakhimov, now 76, spoke out against the Kremlin last summer and analysts have been predicting his demise ever since.
And his press service confirmed on Tuesday afternoon that he has agreed to step down from the post he has held since Dec. 1993 following a meeting with Sergei Naryshkin, head of the presidential administration, according to Interfax.
A new broom for the regions?
With long-serving Chuvash president Nikolai Fyodorov also standing down after 16 years in office it could hint at a Kremlin “clean-up” of long-serving – and often obstructive – regional heads.
And that could have an impact on the fate of Moscow’s mayor Yury Luzhkov, whose departure has been said to be imminent for much of this year.
The Bashkir leader was still able to wring a few concessions from Naryshkin, concerning both the timing of his departure and the short-list of his potential successors.
It seems that the net has been tightening around Rakhimov for a while. Following his complaints that Moscow was over-centralising power and United Russia was ruling by diktat he faced scathing media attacks from NTV, Channel 1 TV and Rossiiskaya Gazeta linking him and his son Ural to a fraud case surrounding the Yumaguzinskoye reservoir.
Ural Rakhimov left his position with Bashneft, a partly state-owned oil firm, last week amid reports of ill-health which kept him away from the regional capital Ufa, Vedomosti added.
Change in Chuvashiya
In Chuvashiya Nikolai Fyodorov is coming to the end of a 16-year stint in power and has asked not to stand at the upcoming regional elections.
Boris Gryzlov, United Russia party chairman, said that the 52-year-old politician was seeking a new post within the federal structure, RIA Novosti reported.http://www.mn.ru/politics/20100713/187926430.html
Hmm... Actually, there is a whole shake-up in the East. Tatarstan President Mintimer Shaimiev, who ruled since the fall of USSR, 'left' his post in a very pecular fashion:
Saying that he wanted to make way for a new generation of leadership—in accordance with a call from President Dmitry Medvedev—Shaimiev told Medvedev in January 2010 that he did not want to be nominated for another term as President of Tatarstan. He said that Rustam Minnikhanov, the Prime Minister of Tatarstan, was his preferred successor.[2] Medvedev then nominated Minnikhanov to succeed Shaimiev on 27 January 2010.[3] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mintimer_Shaimiev)
Then President of Yakutia, Vyacheslav Shtyrov left office in May this year (and is now serving as a Representative in the Federal Council (Senator) for Yakutia in Moscow.
I wonder what Putin and Medvedev are doing... If they want to get rid of all the 'Little Tsars' of the East, how come Putin recently extended the term limit for Governor of Kemerovo Oblast, Aman Tuleyev, who runs a totalitarian, fascist police state in his province?
Maybe it's not all Little Tsars they are going after, just the disloyal ones. Rakhimov, he was not happy with Putin. He wanted to build the biggest, grandest mosque of all of Eurasia in his capital, Ufa, a eternal monument to himself and his rule, the egomaniac bastard that he is; and he asked Putin for money, back in 2008. There was a recession and all that, so, understandably, Putin, basically, told him off, we got all this crap on our hands, we can't deal with or waste money on such nonsense now, you want your mosque, do like Moscow did with Christ the Saviour's Cathedral, raise your own money. Well, Rakhimov tried to do that, couldn't. Not enough people in Bashkortostan cared enough about this 'project'. He was bitter about it every since, I guess.
Murtaza Rakhimov, president of the Ural republic of Bashkortistan, is said to be close to leaving office after tense negotiations with United Russia chiefs.
Rakhimov, now 76, spoke out against the Kremlin last summer and analysts have been predicting his demise ever since.
And his press service confirmed on Tuesday afternoon that he has agreed to step down from the post he has held since Dec. 1993 following a meeting with Sergei Naryshkin, head of the presidential administration, according to Interfax.
A new broom for the regions?
With long-serving Chuvash president Nikolai Fyodorov also standing down after 16 years in office it could hint at a Kremlin “clean-up” of long-serving – and often obstructive – regional heads.
And that could have an impact on the fate of Moscow’s mayor Yury Luzhkov, whose departure has been said to be imminent for much of this year.
The Bashkir leader was still able to wring a few concessions from Naryshkin, concerning both the timing of his departure and the short-list of his potential successors.
It seems that the net has been tightening around Rakhimov for a while. Following his complaints that Moscow was over-centralising power and United Russia was ruling by diktat he faced scathing media attacks from NTV, Channel 1 TV and Rossiiskaya Gazeta linking him and his son Ural to a fraud case surrounding the Yumaguzinskoye reservoir.
Ural Rakhimov left his position with Bashneft, a partly state-owned oil firm, last week amid reports of ill-health which kept him away from the regional capital Ufa, Vedomosti added.
Change in Chuvashiya
In Chuvashiya Nikolai Fyodorov is coming to the end of a 16-year stint in power and has asked not to stand at the upcoming regional elections.
Boris Gryzlov, United Russia party chairman, said that the 52-year-old politician was seeking a new post within the federal structure, RIA Novosti reported.http://www.mn.ru/politics/20100713/187926430.html
Hmm... Actually, there is a whole shake-up in the East. Tatarstan President Mintimer Shaimiev, who ruled since the fall of USSR, 'left' his post in a very pecular fashion:
Saying that he wanted to make way for a new generation of leadership—in accordance with a call from President Dmitry Medvedev—Shaimiev told Medvedev in January 2010 that he did not want to be nominated for another term as President of Tatarstan. He said that Rustam Minnikhanov, the Prime Minister of Tatarstan, was his preferred successor.[2] Medvedev then nominated Minnikhanov to succeed Shaimiev on 27 January 2010.[3] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mintimer_Shaimiev)
Then President of Yakutia, Vyacheslav Shtyrov left office in May this year (and is now serving as a Representative in the Federal Council (Senator) for Yakutia in Moscow.
I wonder what Putin and Medvedev are doing... If they want to get rid of all the 'Little Tsars' of the East, how come Putin recently extended the term limit for Governor of Kemerovo Oblast, Aman Tuleyev, who runs a totalitarian, fascist police state in his province?
Maybe it's not all Little Tsars they are going after, just the disloyal ones. Rakhimov, he was not happy with Putin. He wanted to build the biggest, grandest mosque of all of Eurasia in his capital, Ufa, a eternal monument to himself and his rule, the egomaniac bastard that he is; and he asked Putin for money, back in 2008. There was a recession and all that, so, understandably, Putin, basically, told him off, we got all this crap on our hands, we can't deal with or waste money on such nonsense now, you want your mosque, do like Moscow did with Christ the Saviour's Cathedral, raise your own money. Well, Rakhimov tried to do that, couldn't. Not enough people in Bashkortostan cared enough about this 'project'. He was bitter about it every since, I guess.