…AND MAY TAKE ONE-THIRD OF DUMA.

By its own reckoning, the Communist party will have a minimum of 120 seats–some 70 from the party slates and at least 50 from single-mandate constituencies–in the 450-seat Duma. The party said yesterday it hopes to add 30 mandates when the votes of parties which did not overcome the 5 percent barrier are divided among parties which did. "Thus one-third of the Duma will be communist," a spokesman boasted. In a post-election appeal to Russia’s citizens, its Central Committee described the solution to "the current crisis" as "the peaceful, gradual restoration of Soviet power of the people." The party will do its utmost to "score another success" in next year’s presidential race. Yesterday it also announced that it will hold a Central Committee plenum on January 15, the same day the new Duma will open its session, to define the party’s position on the presidential election. (2)

Yeltsin: "No Cause For Alarm."