DATE=3/24/2000
TYPE=BACKGROUND REPORT
TITLE=RUSSIA / ELECTIONS
NUMBER=5-45999
BYLINE=EVE CONANT
DATELINE=MOSCOW
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: Russia is preparing for presidential elections
on March 26th. Acting President Vladimir Putin, who
took over the Kremlin when President Boris Yeltsin
resigned on New Years Eve, is widely expected to win.
Mr. Putin is known as a tough talking leader and the
man behind second war in Chechnya. V-O-A's Eve Conant
reports on an election most Russians say has already
been decided.
TEXT: On Sunday, Russia will vote for a new
president. For many, however, the campaign has
resembled the character of the likely favorite
Vladimir Putin - calm, decisive and lacking the drama
and upheavals that characterized the Yeltsin years.
Most people in Moscow, such as student Sergei
Alexandrov, say they already know who their next
president will be.
/// ACT ALEXANDROV IN RUSSIAN AND FADE UNDER ///
"Vladimir Putin" he says. "I like him as a man and a
politician. I am tired of all the other candidates."
Or there is Doctor Tatyana Moisenkovskaya who will
also vote for Mr. Putin, but for a different reason.
///ACT MOISENKOVSKAYA IN RUSSIAN AND FADE UNDER///
She says "I will vote for him because I am against the
communists. He is the only candidate who has a high
enough rating to beat them."
Telephone engineer and young mother Zhana Gulyaeva
does not support Vladimir Putin although she does
expect him to win. Speaking from her home, she
explains how she has joined the growing ranks of
frustrated Russians who say they will vote for "none
of the above" when they go to the polling booth.
///ACT GULYAEVA IN RUSSIAN AND FADE UNDER///
She says "I have not seen a single politician yet that
could change my life for the better. Any proper leader
would not get involved with these scandals and games
we see on television."
Her husband, Slava Gulyaev, who works as a
stockbroker, says he will not bother voting for his
first choice, the liberal Grigory Yavlinsky, because
he has no chance to win.
///ACT GULYAEV IN RUSSIAN AND FADE UNDER///
"Even if he is my favorite candidate, why waste my
vote on him?" He says, "We all know it is Mr. Putin
who is going to be president. I will just vote for him
and get it over with."
On the other side of Moscow is 59-year old factory
worker Antonina Safrygina. She was one of the victims
of a series of apartment bombings last year that
Moscow blamed on Chechen rebels. The blasts killed
hundreds and helped sparked public support for the war
in Chechnya.
Mr. Putin, then Russia's prime minister, saw his
support skyrocket after what many Russian's viewed as
his decisive handling of the Chechen threat. Antonina
Safrygina survived the blast, which blew her old
apartment in half.
She says she is not convinced it was Chechens who blew
up her home. She wonders whether the Kremlin might
have been behind the blasts but says it is best not to
ask too many questions. Still, she says she is angry
with Russia's leaders and will vote for Communist
candidate Gennady Zyuganov.
/// OPT ///
"I trust the Communists," she says. "The democrats
deceived and hurt us, especially older people like me.
They took away our pensions. You young people will
always survive - but what can older people do?"
/// NAT SOUND TV UNDER ///
Antonina Safrygina spends much of her time watching
television in her new, smaller apartment in a
neighborhood where she has yet to meet anyone. She is
furious that Acting President Putin suggested Russia
join NATO and says the United States just wants to
humiliate Russia. She thinks Mr. Putin is only popular
because he is on television so often.
She says, "he may become president but it is only
because the television is pressuring us so much,
repeating the same stories over and over again."
// END OPT ///
///NAT SOUND MEGAPHONE - COMMUNIST DEMO UP & UNDER///
Although the Communists still gather here outside Red
Square, they are preaching to a smaller audience each
year. Polls indicate Communist candidate Gennady
Zyuganov might win around 20 percent of the vote. But
most say his only threat to Mr. Putin is to force a
second round of voting, that he does not have a chance
to win.
Those who come out on these cold winter mornings are
mostly the elderly who remember the stable years of
the Soviet regime and do not believe Mr. Putin is the
person to bring it back for them. Many of those
interviewed do not believe Mr. Putin's pledge to fight
corruption or clean up the Kremlin bureaucracy. For
them, Acting President Putin is simply a younger
version of former President Yeltsin, ready to preside
over corruption and economic decline just as Mr.
Yeltsin did. (Signed)
NEB/EC/GE/JO
24-Mar-2000 09:12 AM EDT (24-Mar-2000 1412 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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