Bubble Bursts on Politburo Perks

Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s new perestroika- without-perks policy is opening up a harsh new world for Politburo members, who now will have to do without their plush country homes, or dachas.

The government has decided that the country’s current and former leaders--except Gorbachev and Premier Nikolai I. Ryzhkov--are no longer entitled to privileges such as the dachas, and they’ve been ordered to move out.

Valery A. Sidorov, an aide to the chairman of the Soviet legislature’s Commission on Privileges, said Monday that the dachas have become a “mass insult” and their occupants will just have to get used to a “normal life style.”

Where once the Soviet high and mighty played and sipped vodka, children will roam. Sidorov said the country homes are being turned over to the Soviet Health Ministry for use as kindergartens and rest homes.

As if losing the dachas wasn’t enough of a blow, retired members of the Communist Party’s long-ruling Politburo will also have to do without the three household workers and black Volga cars the government has been providing them virtually free of charge, Sidorov said.

They also will lose the right to order food from special government stocks.

The changes are part of a general attack on the perks of the Soviet elite that, under public pressure, Gorbachev reluctantly agreed to endorse only last year.

In a country where shortages of housing, food and consumer goods are a major source of discontent, the network of special stores, private airports, sleek black limousines, fancy homes and high-quality medical care for the government and party elite has generated massive public fury.

Maverick Communist Boris N. Yeltsin built a parliamentary election campaign on the issue last year, and became wildly popular because of it.

Most of the Soviet leadership’s dachas--some are believed to feature tennis courts and private swimming pools and fountains--are on the outskirts of Moscow and shrouded in secrecy.

They are surrounded by fences and guards and traffic police stop anyone venturing close to the secluded “dacha rows.”

In a reflection of the secrecy, Sidorov said in a phone interview that he did not know how many dachas are affected, and he declined to provide a complete list of who would have to move out.