LEBED TO RUN FOR OFFICE?

General Aleksandr Lebed is said to be thinking of standing for the post of governor of Krasnoyarsk Krai, which comes up for election this year. (NTV, January 25) Since losing his Security Council post, Lebed has declined to run for public office, insisting that an ailing Yeltsin would soon be vacating the presidency, the post Lebed covets. Now, however, Lebed is said to have decided that he will be better placed to play an influential role in politics if he has a governorship. This would automatically give him a place in the upper house of the Russian parliament, the Federation Council.

One of Russia’s most highly developed regions, Krasnoyarsk Krai is rich in natural resources. Dominating eastern Siberia, it has been seen as the likely center of a future "super-region" that might emerge in that region. It shares a border with the Republic of Khakassia, which used to be subordinated to the krai and which is now headed by Lebed’s younger brother. The incumbent governor, Valery Zubov, is a proponent of market reform who has run into strong local opposition. Communist candidates and members of Lebed’s Honor and Motherland party did well in the elections to the regional legislature last December.

Financial Times