April 23, 1998  
This Date's Issues: 2162•  2163• 

Johnson's Russia List
#2163
23 April 1998
davidjohnson@erols.com

[Note from David Johnson:
I leave this afternoon for Moscow. I can be contacted
in Moscow c/o Fred Weir (fweir@glas.apc.org). Phone:
237-0443, 236-3194. I hope davidjohnson@erols.com will work.
1. Reuters: Yeltsin, parliament chiefs in last bid to defuse 
crisis.
2. Reuters: Russia in legal limbo if early election called.
3. Reuters: Russia crisis makes tycoons nervous.
4. Vek: Konstantin MIKHAILOV, WHAT WILL BE IF IT WILL BE?
5. Commersant Daily: Andrei Bagrov, KIRIYENKO OKAYS SECRET 
ACTION PLAN. (Re IMF).
6. Christian Science Monitor editorial: Russian Crossroad.
7. Robert Lyle (RFE/RL): Private Farmers Slowly Come Into Their 
Own.
8. Moscow Times: Lyudmila Dmitriyeva, ESSAY: Law Turns Blind Eye 
to Violence in the Family.
9. Moscow Times: Yelena Bragina, Losing Investor Trust.]

*******

#1
Yeltsin, parliament chiefs in last bid to defuse crisis
By Gareth Jones 

MOSCOW, April 23 (Reuters) - President Boris Yeltsin and the speakers of
Russia's two houses of parliament planned one final attempt on Thursday to
defuse a month-old political crisis and avert early parliamentary elections. 
But, with just one day of political haggling left before Friday's crucial
vote
on Russia's next prime minister, neither Yeltsin nor his communist foes showed
signs of backing down. 
Yeltsin was due to meet Gennady Seleznyov, speaker of the State Duma lower
chamber, and Yegor Stroyev, chairman of the upper house Federation Council, at
11 a.m. (0700 GMT). 
A growing band of people, including sacked prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin
and influential regional governors, urged the Duma to swallow its pride and
back Yeltsin's youthful candidate for premier, Sergei Kiriyenko. 
If the Duma rejects Kiriyenko on Friday for a third time, Yeltsin must
dissolve the chamber and call fresh parliamentary elections. The president
would rule by decree in the interim. 
Yeltsin's nomination of the 35-year-old ex-banker on March 23 to replace
Chernomyrdin with a brief to speed up market reforms was controversial from
the start. 
The communists and their allies, who dominate the Duma, say Kiriyenko is too
young and inexperienced to take on the second most powerful job in Russian
politics. They deeply distrust his liberal views on economic and social
issues. 
The Communist Party's Central Committee was to meet in plenary session to
decide how its deputies should vote on Friday. 
In a sign of the political heart-searching now taking place, one communist
leader said each committee member would have to stand up and personally
express an opinion on Kiriyenko's nomination instead of just voting for a
prepared draft. 
``The last time the party used this procedure was perhaps when it was
deciding
in 1918 whether to sign a humiliating peace deal with the Germans or sacrifice
the revolution,'' he said. 
Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov appeared in no mood for compromise.
``We are ready for elections,'' he said on Wednesday, adding that a new Duma
would be even more hostile to Yeltsin and his market reforms than the current
one. 
Yeltsin was equally adamant. ``The president's position on Sergei Kiriyenko's
nomination as prime minister is final and cannot be changed,'' a presidential
press service official told Reuters. 
The Federation Council, which groups regional leaders, came out in favour of
Kiriyenko and urged the Duma to drop its opposition. 
``The people are waiting for a decision so that a government can be formed to
tackle the country's problems,'' said regional governor Alexei Lebed, brother
of former paratroop general and potential presidential candidate Alexander
Lebed. 
Chernomyrdin, who was prime minister for more than five years and hopes to
succeed Yeltsin as president in the year 2000, also said the Duma must accept
Kiriyenko. Early parliamentary elections would be very costly, he said. 
It was far from clear whether Zyuganov would be able to swing all his party's
deputies behind his tough line and one communist leader, Valentin Kuptsov,
rated the chances of a change in the Duma's position on Kiriyenko at 50-50. 
Many deputies will doubtless be thinking of the perks they stand to lose,
including chauffeur-driven cars, personal allowances and free housing and
travel, if they vote themselves out of a job. 
To rub home the importance of the choice awaiting them, Duma members were
handed a fact sheet on Wednesday entitled: ``Information on deputies' rights
and guarantees in the case of the dissolution of the State Duma.'' 
The guarantees included a one-way ticket home for them and their spouses
along
with free transport of up to 10 tonnes of personal goods. 

********

#2
Russia in legal limbo if early election called
By Kevin Liffey 

MOSCOW, April 22 (Reuters) - Russia may be thrust this week into a snap
general election but, five years after introducing a new constitution, it does
not have a clear legal basis on which to hold the vote. 
As things stand, not one political party is eligible to stand and there
are no
definitive rules for determining when the election will take place, Alexander
Ivanchenko, head of the electoral commission, told a news conference on
Wednesday. 
An election must be called if the Duma, the lower house of parliament, on
Friday rejects Sergei Kiriyenko, President Boris Yeltsin's nominee for
premier, at the third time of asking. 
Election laws do exist, but they are in many instances unclear or
contradictory on the subject of an early election. An improved, consistent
draft electoral law also exists, but the Duma has dragged its feet over it. 
``If the Duma is dissolved, an election will be held according to the
existing
electoral law and the new law on guaranteeing citizens' electoral rights --
and the presidential decrees that we will be obliged to accept to remove the
gaps and contradictions in the two laws,'' Ivanchenko said. 
``As so often in Russia, the cobbler finds himself without any shoes,'' he
added, effectively appealing to deputies not to reject Kiriyenko by urging
them to get on with their primary job of lawmaking. 
Presidential decrees, enabling Yeltsin virtually to rewrite the electoral
system to his own taste without getting parliament's say-so, are the subject
of more than a little controversy. 
Yeltsin's aides have hinted that the election could be held under new rules
which would scrap the system of electing half of the 450 deputies through
party lists. 
Political analysts say that electing the Duma solely by local constituency
would make the currently dominant communist faction less manageable, whatever
its size, because deputies would depend more on their voters than on the party
bosses. 
Plenty of inconsistencies are raised by the 1997 law on electors' rights,
which seeks to provide a better democratic basis for elections, but did not
exist when the 1995 electoral law was passed. 
Basic questions of who can stand in the election, how electoral lists are
drawn up, how polling stations are set up, how local commissions are formed
and how campaigns are financed are all subject to interpretation -- or decree.
Some deputies have suggested Yeltsin could delay dissolving the Duma or
calling a new election, fearing that it might return a stronger communist
faction. 
Ivanchenko said the constitution obliged Yeltsin to dissolve the Duma the
moment he named a new premier. But although an election could be held as early
as August or September, there was no clear time limit for him to set a date. 
Yeltsin would need time to pass electoral decrees. But Ivanchenko said the
electoral commission would not give him unlimited time and would if necessary
itself set a date which would certainly be before the end of 1998. 
Some opposition deputies, softening their anti-Kiriyenko stance now that they
could be voting themselves out of a job, say their constituents are balking at
the cost of an early election. 

Ivanchenko said it would cost at least 450 million roubles ($73 million), a
hefty drain on an already overburdened state budget. 

*******

#3
TALKING POINT-Russia crisis makes tycoons nervous
By Timothy Heritage 

MOSCOW, April 22 (Reuters) - The battle over who should be Russia's next prime
minister is being closely watched by a small group of powerful financiers who
fear a change of government may put their influence at risk. 
But despite signs that a battle is under way behind the scenes between
Kremlin
liberals and some of the tycoons, few political analysts believe the so-called
``oligarchies'' are about to disappear from the scene when a new premier takes
office. 
Top of the Kremlin liberals' hit list is business and media magnate Boris
Berezovsky, whose position has been weakened by widely publicised reports that
President Boris Yeltsin recently scolded him. But even he looks hard to
dislodge. 
``I think this is a colossal crisis for Berezovsky but I don't think it will
be his end. He is too strong when it comes to intrigues and politics,'' said
Sergei Markov, head of Moscow's Institute of Political Studies think-tank. 
Political commentator Andrei Kolesnikov said Yeltsin's choice of 35-year-old
Sergei Kiriyenko as prime minister was unlikely to cause a major upset in the
delicate balance of forces, even if some were nervous. 
The moment of truth for Kiriyenko will come on Friday, when the Duma,
parliament's lower house, must either approve his candidacy or reject him and
trigger its own dissolution and an early election. 
``The Duma has been able to understand that backing Kiriyenko means keeping
the balance of the basic political and financial-industrial forces, not
allowing any to become stronger,'' Kolesnikov wrote in the liberal newspaper
Sevodnya. 
The main players watching nervously include Uneximbank head Vladimir Potanin,
Most Group chief and media magnate Vladimir Gusinsky, Mikhail Khodorkovsky of
the Menatep Group and Alexander Smolensky of SBS-AgroBank. 
But the one at risk, according to many reports, is Berezovsky, whose
tentacles
reach into Yeltsin's close circle through his friendship with the president's
family and with Kremlin chief-of-staff Valentin Yumashev. 
His name has frequently been associated with the kind of intrigues which
Yeltsin has said he wants to do away with. 
Far from being drawbacks, Kiriyenko's lack of political experience or obvious
ties with powerful lobby groups were seen by Yeltsin as advantages when he
named him to replace sacked prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin on March 23. 
Most of Russia's powerful businessmen, seven of whom proved their worth by
getting together to bankroll Yeltsin's successful re-election campaign in
1996, have kept silent in public on Kiriyenko's nomination and watched
nervously as events unfold. 
One, Potanin, backed Kiriyenko. ``I believe he has what it takes to occupy
this post,'' he told reporters this week. 
Potanin enjoyed a good relationship with the liberal reformers who took
on the
oligarchies with mixed success under the last government, which said their
meddling was a hindrance to economic reforms. He could gain if Berezovsky
loses out. 
Berezovsky, 52, has been far from silent. 
He brought attention on himself by appearing to deprive Chernomyrdin of his
support the day before the veteran prime minister was sacked, a move initially
interpreted as evidence that the tycoon was instrumental in the dismissal. 
But Berezovsky later denied he was involved and seemed irked that he had not
been consulted in the choice of Kiriyenko. 
He said in a television interview that a Kremlin ally, Ivan Rybkin, would be
no worse a choice than Kiriyenko and defied Yeltsin by backing his foe
Alexander Lebed in a local election. 
He rubbed salt into the wounds by saying Kiriyenko might not be up to
standing
in for Yeltsin if the president fell ill. 
``In our constitution there is written a scenario where Kiriyenko would be in
a situation where he had to fulfil the president's duties. That worries me,''
he said. 
Berezovsky went on the attack after reports leaked from the Kremlin said
Yeltsin had threatened to exile him if he did not halt his intrigues. 
Some newspapers say Berezovsky has secretly been trying to persuade the
opposition Communists to reject Kiriyenko in Friday's decisive vote, and has
also been trying to ensure the two top liberal reformers do not get specific
posts if Kiriyenko is confirmed. 
The unconfirmed reports suggest he opposes Anatoly Chubais becoming head of
the UES power utility and does not want Boris Nemtsov to be put in charge of
state companies known as ``natural monopolies'' which dominate their
industrial sector. 
These attacks may be the work of Berezovsky's business rivals, jostling for
position before a government is formed. 
They may also have been inspired by liberal political opponents hoping to
push
the tycoon towards a fatal defeat. 
``If Yeltsin and Kiriyenko do not yield to pressure in the next few days, the
oligarchies' time may be over,'' said one well-informed source. 
Others poured cold water on such suggestions, noting that the businessmen
have
suffered serious defeats and crises before and yet managed to claw back power.
``What someone like Berezovsky does after a defeat is to concentrate on
consolidating their position again,'' Markov said. 

*******

#4
>From RIA Novosti
Vek, No. 16
April 1998
WHAT WILL BE IF IT WILL BE?
Duma, President Likely To meet Each Other Halfway
"Don't start the machinery! It will blow up!"
Popular wisdom
By Konstantin MIKHAILOV

A policy of principle is not quite safe. 
The president has promised that he would not go back on
his word and would suggest Sergei Kiriyenko for the premiership
three times in a row. Moreover, he hints he will not cry if the
Duma is constitutionally disbanded. 
The Duma faction leaders, in turn, insist that Yeltsin's
personnel policy in general and Kiriyenko in particular are
wrong. 
This paper has data to indicate that when Gennady
Seleznev, the lower chamber's speaker, called on the Duma to
confirm the president's nominee, he was accused of opportunism
by some members. Many law-makers intend to 'stick to the
principle' until the very end, whatever it is.
So what will happen if both sides stand fast, the Duma
blackballs Kiriyenko for a third time and the president
disbands it?
Simply, there would be no normal government and no lower
house. Some time will be spent on deliberations around broader
powers for the Federation Council, the upper house, but the
initiative is no go if only because it goes against the current
Constitution and legislation and can exacerbate the political
situation still more. 
The situation would be beneficial for the Kremlin and the
president's administration. It is easy to run an acting premier
and acting ministers. There would be no Duma to make laws, but
the president would continue to sign decrees he needs. The
policy of checks and balances will have to be applied within
the president's administration and entourage, which is
admittedly easier to do than when there is the Duma and the
normal Cabinet. 
On the other hand... but who's thinking of that 'other
hand'? Yes, an 'acting' government is not as efficient as a
'normal' Cabinet. Moreover, the former is likely to spoil what
the latter might have attained. Yes, the nation would live by
the president's decrees for a period of time. Yes, foreign
investors prefer stable countries and find it hard to deal with
acting premiers and ministers. Yes, the West would hardly
welcome a repetition of the 1993 scenario, even if bloodless
and constitutional. 
But power is at stake, and the year 2000 is at hand. This
premise is stronger than all other arguments and the redivision
of power launched (even if on the level of instincts) by
Yeltsin cannot stop in mid-stride. 
Of course, the scenario of no legislative or executive
authority cannot but be temporary. A new Duma will have to be
elected and a new Cabinet will have to be formed. But time is
money, for the effectively unlimited power (which is being in
control of resources, riches and revenues) even for a few
months may arm one for the 2000 election battles.
The Kremlin and the administration are well aware of this:
Yeltsin did not hint without a reason that the Duma's
disbandment is quite possible. But he did not disclose what it
would mean for the nation. 
It has to be admitted for the sake of fairness that the
Chernomyrdin Cabinet's resignation had not been intended to be
the beginning of a national political crisis. Not fortuitously,
Yeltsin initially intended to perform the premier's duties
himself: the opposition would not have dared oppose it as
vehemently as Kiriyenko's nomination. There would have been no
political storm if Yeltsin had sufficient time to deploy
forces. But a constitutional flaw forced him to nominate
Kiriyenko. hence the crisis. 
But the president may also suffer if the above scenario
comes true. One can win a lot in an unstable situation, but one
can lose, too. In 1993, the young financial and industrial
elite could not but support Yeltsin: doing otherwise would have
been suicidal. The same sense of unity in the face of an 'alien
threat' triumphed in 1996, too. 
In 1998, this elite has become so much stronger and
possessing vast financial and information resources. Who can
guarantee that in the short span of time in between two
governments the 'oligarchs' would not want to recarve power to
their own tastes? Who can guarantee that they would not play
the trump card of political and economic stability against the
president?
Why economic and political instability is pernicious for
the nation is well known. 
So far, the president and the Duma have been on a
collision course. One possible detour has been overlooked.
Voting on Kiriyenko in the Duma provides a chance to avoid 
the collision. Both the president and the lower house should
slow down and stop for the responsibility is for both sides 
to bear. 
The president has said he would not budge. Seleznev may
have made his peaceable statement when he saw that the
president means it. 
But theoretically both sides can yield. If the Duma
confirms Kiriyenko, the political crisis may be somewhat
ameliorated. But the future Cabinet would be working amid
highly nervous circumstances and any flop would be followed by
cries of "We warned you!" The Cabinet's reports and demands of
its resignation would be on the daily agenda in the lower
chamber. 
Starting up the machinery of political confrontation is
easy. Stopping it is infinitely more difficult.

********

#5
>From RIA Novosti
Commersant Daily
April 21, 1998
KIRIYENKO OKAYS SECRET ACTION PLAN
Kiriyenko Doesn't Want the State Duma to Learn 
About That Plan
By Andrei BAGROV

Acting Russian prime minister Sergei Kiriyenko doesn't
want to promise anything concrete on the eve of the April 24
State-Duma vote.
However, Kiriyenko has already made all the required
decisions.
Commersant Daily has acquainted itself with a secret plan
of the government's top-priority measures inside the
tax-and-budgetary sphere (that was signed by Kiriyenko
himself).
Russia's possible failure to implement this plan would
deprive it of all IMF financial aid.

The IMF board of directors has received two documents from
Sergei Dubinin, who heads the Russian delegation at a regular
annual spring-time session of international financial
institutions.
The approval of such documents would enable Russia to
receive extended IMF financial aid (that is, $2.8 billion in
loans throughout 1998).
The first document, e.g. a joint statement by the Central
Bank of Russia and this country's government, which deals with
their 1998 economic policies, has been officially announced.
However, both sides have preferred to keep mum on the
second document, i.e. a plan of top-priority measures inside
the tax-budgetary sphere and the economic-restructuring policy.
The thing is that a joint statement is not seen as
something binding by the Russian cabinet; in fact, this is
nothing but a letter of intent.
Russian ministries get their concrete orders in line with
a subsequent special government resolution.
Acting prime minister Kiriyenko has decided to anticipate
events because IMF monies have to be received as soon as
possible.
A document stamped "Present Immediately" was sent to
Washington because the IMF must be convinced that Russia has
already started fulfilling its commitments.
Ministers, as well as high-ranking
government-administration officials, alone were acquainted with
the full text of that top-priority action plan, which lists
nearly 20 points. The concerned "project managers" were only
informed about those particular sections, which must be
fulfilled by them.
Such secrecy is hardly surprising. By signing this plan,
Kiriyenko has made it clear that he doesn't intend to fulfil
those specific wishes of deputies and public segments, which
run counter to IMF demands. Apart from that, Kiriyenko would
like to accomplish various objectives that were announced by
the so-called young reformists early this year.
First of all, Kiriyenko's plan stipulates a tough federal
austerity program. The IMF has been promised that the
registration of all federal-level civil officers will be
completed already this April (with a view to pruning their
ranks). The exact number of redundant civil officers is still
unknown.
However, it's no coincidence that First Deputy Finance
Minister Alexei Kudrin has bragged about the possible
resignation of 200,000 people early this April.
Kiriyenko's plan calls for reduced federal spending; in
fact, such spending is to be slashed by 40 billion roubles.
The Russian Ministry of Finance estimates that federal
departments have spent an additional 70 billion roubles (or so)
on municipal-utilities payments, repair operations,
construction programs and the purchase of office equipment
(well in excess of specific ceilings).
But even the IMF understands that all unjustified
budgetary expenditures can't be eliminated within a year.
All debtors and tax evaders are going to be punished
severely. The nation's oil companies, which owe money to the
federal budget, shall enjoy limited access to trunk oil
pipelines during the third quarter and onwards.
The State Tax Service was ordered to transfer the 10
biggest tax-payers under the jurisdiction of a specialized tax
inspectorate by April 15.
According to Alexander Pochinok, this process has already
begun; however, the STS chief still refuses to name such
enterprises.
Some provisions of Kiriyenko's plan have already been
fulfilled. Among other things, President Boris Yeltsin of the
Russian Federation has signed a decree on abolishing various
privileges (as regards the incomplete transfer of specific
dividends being derived from state-owned stocks into the
federal budget) April 15 in line with Russia's promises to the
IMF. 
Besides, the Russian population now has to pay more money
for natural gas (e.g. 76 percent of the corporate wholesale
price). Meanwhile the Russian Ministry for Foreign Economic
Contacts and Trade has drafted a resolution on charging less
impressive import duties on those specific goods, which have no
Russian-made equivalents (i.e. yachts and some aircraft
models); such duties shall be reduced from 30 percent (maximum
rates) to 20 percent.
By all looks, Kiriyenko's IMF commitments will cause the
negative attitude of quite a few deputies. However, no matter
who becomes Russia's next premier, he or she can't shy away
from realizing such commitments. Otherwise a more acute
budgetary crisis seems inevitable.

******

#6
Christian Science Monitor
APRIL 23, 1998 
Editorial
Russian Crossroad

A great nation nears trouble when its predominant middle class cannot 
make its weight felt. Russia faces that situation today.
Lawmakers will vote a decisive third time Friday on whether to install a 
new reform prime minister, Sergei Kiriyenko. His task: to tame the 
oligarchic capitalism that replaced total-monopoly communism.
Communists in parliament (malefactors of lost power) and the men who 
bought the Communist state's prime assets at bargain prices (malefactors 
of great wealth who fear losing power) threaten the center.
At that center stands Boris Yeltsin, the quixotic, imperious populist 
who burst on the scene 15 years ago by facing down party hacks 
threatened by his popularity. He has since made a career of weaving 
between bold younger reformers and powerful old-guard and new-guard 
opponents.
Kiriyenko and First Deputy Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov, both in their 
thirties, represent Yeltsin's attempt to provide tangible benefits to 
ordinary citizens. They represent the nation's future, symbolically and 
literally. Kiriyenko deserves a yes vote, for the sake of Russia's 
long-suffering people.

*******

#7
Russia: Private Farmers Slowly Come Into Their Own
By Robert Lyle

Chapaivo, Nizhny Novgorod, 22 April 1998 (RFE/RL) -- Lydia Rusina was chief
economist on the Chapaivo collective farm when she retired a few years ago,
but the now 60 year old woman didn't want to be just another pensioner. She 
wanted to be a family farmer. 
"What's important is to work on your own land," she says resolutely. The
Russian constitution of 1993 grants the right to buy and sell farm land, but
with little law to define or support that right, the practical impact has been
minimal. 
Except in Nizhny Novgorod and 10 other Oblasts where a farm privatization
model was first worked out in 1993-94 by the International Finance Corporation
(IFC), the World Bank's private sector arm. Implementation has been slow,
although 386 collective or state farms have been reorganized into 664 new 
farming enterprises and 650 new family farms since then, according to the IFC. 
Chapaivo collective farm is about average for the Sokorskoy region 170
kilometers north of Nizhny Novgorod city. It encompasses 1,781 hectares,
numerous outbuildings, and a small village where the farm's 212 workers and
pensioners live. It's mix of grain fields, cattle, pigs and chickens
apparently
did no better or worse than other collective farms in the region, although the
IFC says productivity on Soviet farms was generally ten times lower than those
in the west. 
Under the model privatization plan, Lydia Rusina and everyone else living on
Chapaivo received a land entitlement certificate worth 6.9 hectares. She also
received property entitlement certificates representing her share of the farm's
trucks, tractors, harvesters and animals. The property certificates have
varying values based on individual tenure and salary history. 
With those certificates in hand, Rusina and her 36-year-old son told the
farm's
leadership they wanted to break off their own family farm. Forty-year-old
Nicholi Leschov and six members of his extended family said they wanted out
too. 
The rest of the 83 workers and 120 pensioners said no, they wanted to keep
the farm together. 
To resolve this seeming impasse, the model farm privatization plan kicked in.
Since each person could sell, trade or lease their certificates to anyone else
on the farm, or give them to a family member, they could technically have
formed any number of groups to bid for the farm's assets. 
But with most of the farm's certificate holders wanting to stay together 
under the leadership of 31-year-old chairman Sergei Metronin, the bargaining
involved only the main group and the Rusina and Leschov families. 
The bidding or auctioning is organized into three rounds. The first is 
where each group outlines the specific plots of land it wants and sits around 
a table to negotiate with the others. If there are disagreements -- different 
groups wanting the same parcel -- then the second round becomes a real auction 
as each party bids more and more land shares (or traded off property shares) to 
get the plot. The highest bid wins. 
The third round is to auction off those pieces of land no one wanted in the
first two rounds, usually making them much cheaper. The same three round
process applies to the farm's property. 
This auction process is called a distribution meeting and when the Chapaivo
farm got together recently in the brightly decorated community center, there
was an air of excitement as residents filed in -- many in their best-dress
clothes -- to watch the proceeding. 
Before it began, Chairman Metronin took the floor to say this is all about
finding a way for bettering the lot of Chapaivo's farmers. "It's all about the
future," he said. 
But a former director of the farm rises to disagree. "I know all the ins and
outs of this farm and I don't like the reform that has taken place," he says.
Still, he adds, he hopes for the best. 
Another member rises to point to neighboring farms where reorganization has
given good results and one has actually stopped its decline. "Let's hope for a
renewal of our own partnership," he adds. 
Then the bidding process begins -- Metronin, Leshov and Rusina sit at
tables in the front row facing a meeting chairman/auctioneer appointed by the 
local raion who presides from the center's small stage. Quickly, the chairman 
calls out the land parcels in the first round as each one of the three confirms 
his or her bid. Then moving quickly to the second round, the chairman calls out 
the plots as the three bid until only one is left. It takes only minutes. 
Then each goes to a large map on the wall and confirms for the assembled farm
members the parcels "purchased." 
Next the farm's equipment -- trucks, tractors, the hostel (apartment
building)
in the village, a storage shed, a barn for cows -- comes under the auctioneers
hammer. No money is exchanged, only property certificates. 
Metronin, with 239 property shares, buys most of the equipment, although
Leshov, with seven property certificates, is able to get a truck, a tractor
and some other equipment. 
Rusina doesn't bid on the equipment -- she says she couldn't afford to buy
any,
but plans to rent all the machinery her family farm needs, some perhaps from
the big farm. She used her property certificates to bolster her bid on the
property she wanted. 
The 11.5 hectares Rusina "bought" for her family farm is at an extreme end of
the old collective, but she chose that spot on purpose. Her brother lives on
the next collective farm and he's bidding on the parcels which abut those she
just acquired. 
The official statistics say that the Rusina family farm will have just two
workers, but by combining with her brother next door, the Rusina family farm
will be a whole new operation. Her son and two daughters will work the farm
with her, she says, learning to "love and appreciate the land and the labor it
takes." 
The bulk of the old collective, over 1,700 hectares, went to the new
agricultural enterprise Chapayev. It has 83 workers and 120 pensioners and
Metronin says he hopes to see a new spirit infuse them because they now better
understand they are the owners. "Most people in the collective farm were not
very enthusiastic about their work," he says, "and if people don't work hard,
there won't be any results." He knows that many of the people in his new
enterprise have serious doubts about the whole thing. Four women, ranging in
age from 21 to 72, sit at the back of the room with unsmiling faces and
murmuring to each other. "We're just not ready for this," says one to a
visiting foreign journalist. "It's the uncertainty that scares us the most,"
adds another. "We don't know what will happen to us." 
The other family farm breaking off from Chapaivo, the one headed by Nicholi
Leshov, acquired nearly 48 hectares to start their operation. With seven
family
members participating, it might one of these days be looking to buy some land
from the main farm. So far, there is no way in Russia to actually sell a piece
of land to anyone who might want to buy it. 
But the pressure is on. Just last week, the Saratov oblast in southwestern
Russia held the country's first private land auction -- selling 20 plots of
land, including farmland, to the highest bidders for money. The deputy
chairman
of Saratov's land committee, Vladimir Prokapchuk, said the auction "sets a
precedent for other regions to follow." And several other oblasts have sent
delegations to learn. 
Communists and nationalists in the Duma have railed against allowing private
land sales, saying it would be like "selling your mother." 
But President Boris Yeltsin's personal representative in Nizhny Novgorod,
Yuri
Lebedev, calls that "nonsense." "What do they think people will do? Carry land
off to Poland or America?" he says with a laugh. Lydia Rusina won't take her
land anywhere. But she's sure, even at 60, that while there is a lot of hard
work ahead, she is doing the right thing. 

*******

#8
Moscow Times
April 22, 1998 
ESSAY: Law Turns Blind Eye to Violence in the Family 
By Lyudmila Dmitriyeva 
Lyudmila Dmitriyeva is an independent journalist. She contributed this 
essay to The Moscow Times. 

The word that the Russian police use to describe family conflicts that 
end in bloodshed is bytovukha, from the word byt, or daily life. In 
other words, there is nothing especially criminal about such conflicts; 
this is simply a way of life for some Russians. People drink, argue and 
fight, breaking each other's noses and collar bones. When parents 
regularly beat their children bloody, sometimes to the point that an 
ambulance has to be called, this is also bytovukha. 
The police treat such domestic occurrences with scorn. They point out 
that businessmen are constantly getting killed in apartment entrances. 
They don't have time to solve family problems. Meanwhile, domestic 
violence accounts for more than one-third of all Russian crime. 
Here is but one such story. A woman went on trial for the murder of her 
former husband. As usual, it occurred in the kitchen, during dinner, in 
front of the children. 
In the courtroom cage, Klavdiya Vedeneyeva answered all of the judge's 
questions by nodding. Yes, she took a knife from the table. Yes, she 
stabbed him. It was strange to hear this coming from a frail little 
woman whose gray hair was colored with henna. There was nothing 
malevolent in her appearance or timid gestures. The judge tried to 
understand just what made her commit such an unthinkable act -- to take 
the life of her children's father. The answer: "It became unbearable. He 
would beat us and drink, drink and beat us -- both me and the children. 
We were always walking around with bruises." 
This lasted for more than 10 years. Her husband was a driver who lost 
his license as the result of a drunken traffic accident. He then worked 
repairing buses and earned rather decent money for the current situation 
in Russia. But he mostly drank away the money, sometimes going out with 
his drinking buddies, sometimes bringing them home. 
Vedeneyeva protested. She was cursed at in response. Then came beatings 
in front of the children. When their teenage son tried to protect his 
mother, he also got hit. The father did not touch their somewhat younger 
daughter as often, but if she raised her voice, he would say, "shut up." 
The neighbors could hear the cries. But when they encountered the 
battered Vedeneyeva on the stairway, they simply looked the other way. 
In the end, worn out from the beatings, Vedeneyeva went to the police. 
There she was shuffled from one chief to another, until finally she 
caught up with a policeman from her region on the precinct steps. She 
explained the situation. In a rush to get somewhere, he listened and 
nodded, and then promised to come by. But he never did. 
She made another attempt to get her husband to calm down by filing a 
complaint. The same policeman ended up with her case, and so was 
compelled to "take action." He went by the home once, spoke to the 
husband and threatened him with a fine. Her husband came off as amenable 
and said: "I just lost control. It happens in every family." Then with a 
grin he added, echoing a well-known Russian proverb: "If a man beats his 
woman, it means he loves her." 
Although she was only 37, 10 years of such "love" had begun to turn 
Vedeneyeva into an old woman. She could not take the children and leave 
the apartment to him. She had nowhere to go. She filed for divorce, and 
it came through. But instead of going away, her former husband remained 
there in the crowded two-room apartment. Their domestic torment 
continued. Only now, he made a point of coming home with drunken women 
from the streets. 
Once, after a loud orgy, he went into the kitchen where Vedeneyeva was 
feeding the children, and, reaching for the tea kettle, pushed her. She 
grabbed a kitchen knife from the table and she stabbed him, not 
remembering herself, as she put it. 
Her lawyer called her deed an act of vigilantism, because both state and 
society had failed to convict her former husband for a decade of abuse 
of his family. Perhaps it was for this reason that in taking her state 
of temporary insanity into account when the crime was committed, the 
judge gave Vedeneyeva (whose name has been changed to protect her and 
her children from further harm) a suspended sentence with no prison 
term. 
The law-enforcement representatives, from the local police to the 
district prosecutor, should have been the ones on trial. Similar 
beatings on the street, for example, would have brought about a criminal 
investigation and conviction. But the Russian family turned out to be 
beyond the law. 
This story is hardly an exception. According to the State Duma committee 
on women, the family and youth, 30 to 40 percent of all extremely 
violent crimes are committed in the family. The committee also found 
that husbands beat their wives and older children abuse their aging 
parents in one in every four Russian families. 
Furthermore, according to Interior Ministry figures, there are more than 
2 million cases a year of parents killing children under the age of 14. 
Children from violent families thus run away from home. There are 50,000 
runaways in Russia today. What will they become in two or three years? 
Professional beggars? Pickpockets? Or the youngest members of organized 
crime groups, accomplices in robberies, thefts and killings? 
One major reason this problem cannot be solved is that the crimes are 
committed with impunity. When violence in the family does not end in 
death, a criminal that has beaten or even maimed a family member almost 
always avoids trial. This is because the victims of family violence in 
Russia seldom call for help from the police. This is simply not done. No 
matter what happens at home, taking family matters beyond the threshold 
is considered shameful. 
Russia is taking some steps toward making people more aware of the 
dangers of such delusions. The State Duma, for example, is preparing a 
law "on the principles of social-legal protection from violence in the 
family." True, when it will be adopted and how it will be implemented 
are all still at issue. A social system for providing this protection is 
also beginning to take form. There are already five women's crisis 
centers, 24 centers for children who have no parental care, 390 shelters 
for teenagers and 159 social-rehabilitation centers for minors. 
This is, of course, very little for such a huge country. According to 
specialists, Russia needs a minimum of 4,000 rehabilitation centers and 
1,500 women's crisis centers. We can only hope that the government will 
in the end be able to create such a viable and effective system. Without 
one, the law against violence in the family will not be effective. This 
cannot be allowed to happen. For there is nowhere left to retreat. The 
Russian family is on the edge. Without further protection, it will fall 
into a gulf of moral dissipation and national degradation. 

******

#9
Moscow Times
April 23, 1998 
Losing Investor Trust 
By Yelena Bragina 
Yelena Bragina is a leading scholar at the Academy of Sciences Institute 
of World Economy and International Relations. She contributed this 
comment to The Moscow Times. 

Attracting long-term investment remains one of Russia's key problems. 
Investment levels continue to decline. During the first months of this 
year, a 7 percent fall was recorded. Foreign investment at the start of 
this year was no higher than $20 billion to $22 billion, only 2 percent 
of the volume of world investment. Moreover, the competition for 
investment funds was sharpened by the recent financial crisis in Asia. 
What about domestic savings of the population that could potentially be 
used for investment? It would seem that the Russian people would be most 
interested in national economic growth. Two questions arise. Do Russian 
citizens have the means for investing and are they prepared to put the 
money earned by the sweat of their brow at the disposal of the state? 
The population's estimated savings of $120 billion -- in rubles and 
dollars -- is impressive at first sight. The bulk of the savings are 
concentrated within a small group of people whose income levels rank in 
the top 10 percent of the country. This money could be used for 
investment, but those who have such means, sensibly realizing the 
permanent instability in the country's economy, prefer to hold on to 
their money the old way. 
The savings of the majority are not very great. But what little savings 
that do exist are iron rations set aside for a rainy day. If you take 
into account, for example, the current fantastic prices for medicine in 
case of serious illness and operations for the average citizen, who can 
no longer count on free medical care -- and, indeed, funerals are not 
inexpensive -- then it is clear that a reserve is necessary. This is 
part of the strategy for survival in our country. 
Another characteristic of savings in Russia is the accumulation of 
foreign currency, in dollars, which are valued for their liquidity. The 
quantity of greenbacks in the population's hands is estimated to be 
between $53 billion to $55 billion. About 40 percent of savings are put 
in commercial banks -- for the most part in Sberbank -- and not more 
than 4 percent are put into treasury bonds. 
There are several economic and social reasons why Russians tend to save 
their money in mattresses. The main one is a low level of trust toward 
the state. The population on the whole, with the exception of a very 
narrow segment of people, collectively have become "cheated investors." 
The 1992 price liberalization wiped out savings that had been entrusted 
to the state. The voucher privatization, created for the entire 
population, allowed the redistribution of property to benefit those who 
were part of the upper ranks of the state apparatus and industrial 
management. Later followed the widespread collapse of commercial banks 
and financial companies, whose claims of 100 percent returns were 
advertised with the silent connivance of the government and Central 
Bank. 
Has the situation changed during the seventh year of reforms? The 
go vernment has formally recognized the devalued deposits of citizens in 
Sberbank to be part of its internal debt and even started a program of 
partial compensation. This is how it looks. For every 1,000 old rubles 
that were lost, 1,000 times that amount will be compensated, whereas 
prices have increased from 7,000 to 10,000 times since 1992. Only 
citizens who have reached the age of 80 are entitled to be recompensed 
in a country where the average life expectancy for men is 57 years. Such 
compensation will hardly strengthen trust in the state. 
Are Russians likely to invest their savings when the news media report 
every day on scandals in the highest echelons of power connected to the 
disappearance of state money earmarked for paying pensions and wages? 
What do they think when they see officials' salaries raised while 32 
million citizens live below the poverty level? 
Citizens disapprove of the behavior of the majority of stock companies 
that do not pay dividends while management lives a life of luxury. Their 
financial activities still lack transparency, and they make every effort 
to shut themselves off from the press. There is another specific Russian 
trait: the uncertainty that bank deposits or stock holdings will remain 
confidential. Moreover, by law, banks are obliged to inform the tax 
organs of any deposits higher than $10,000. There is a real danger that 
financial information will be leaked and that racketeering will ensue. 
All of this makes the investment climate in Russia extremely vulnerable 
and fragile for the average investor. 
He feels the constant pressure of changing conditions on the stock 
ma rket and finds the information about it to be contradictory and 
incomplete. This determines the unhealthy and inadequate reactions of 
potential investors and their tendency to believe that changes are being 
prepared, usually for the worse. A typical example is the recent 
announcement by the Central Bank chairman, Sergei Dubinin, in an 
interview with the Financial Times about the gradual devaluation of the 
ruble within the currency corridor. This was taken to mean that the 
ruble would be quickly devalued. Immediately following this, acting 
Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko said he considered devaluation of the 
ruble inadmissable, but the word had already gotten out. 
The necessary conditions for investment are well known -- stability, 
reliability of the economic and political milieu and trust in your 
partner. In Russia, the state is still an unreliable partner, especially 
for its own citizens. Distrust turns into a shortage of investment 
funds, without which the economy cannot emerge from its current crisis. 

********