Yeltsin Tells Radical Plan for Economy : Russia: He asks Parliament for extra powers and assumes full responsibility. Prices are expected to skyrocket.

Russian Federation President Boris N. Yeltsin, laying all his power and popularity on the line, launched a last-ditch bid on Monday to force through radical economic reforms that he promised will save Russia--if its people will only stick with him through a year of excruciating change.

Taking full responsibility for the reform plan, which is expected to send prices skyrocketing to more than triple their current levels, Yeltsin asked Parliament for extra powers to implement it. And he claimed direct control of the government for himself instead of appointing a new prime minister.

The decision to push through the Russian version of economic shock therapy, with its dangers of unemployment and deepening poverty, is the most important of his life, Yeltsin said. But “the time has come to act--decisively, harshly and without vacillation,” he told the Congress of People’s Deputies in a strident, hourlong speech broadcast live to the 150 million citizens of the Russian Federation.

“I have never looked for easy roads,” Yeltsin said. “I see that the coming months will be the most difficult for me ever. But if I have your support and faith, I am ready to take this road together with you to the end.”

The brawny Siberian will need every bit of his legendary mass appeal to reconcile Russians to the most dreaded part of the reform outline he presented on Monday--the lifting before year’s end of government price controls that have kept everything from bread to cars relatively cheap, though in short supply, for decades.

Yevgeny Yasin, a top economic consultant to the Russian Federation leadership, said that prices can be expected to triple or quadruple but that if the reform goes badly they could increase as much as tenfold. He also questioned Yeltsin’s pledge that prices will begin to drop within six months and a real economic turnaround will start by next fall.

“I think this will be a lot more painful than it was in Poland because the process is long overdue here and the economy is very weak, with production dropping,” Yasin said. “It will be a lot harder, but we have to do it.”

Along with promising the beginnings of abundance by next fall, Yeltsin pledged improved support, from soup kitchens to food stamps, to help the poor through the coming period and outlined the positive aspects of his plan to turn the collapsing economy around by encouraging private enterprise.

The plan includes:

* The government selloff of about 10,000 state-owned small- and medium-size factories and billions of dollars’ worth of unfinished construction sites within three months; also, the privatization of state-owned housing and masses of stores, restaurants and other businesses.

* The purchase of billions of rubles and millions of dollars worth of agricultural equipment to support the quick, forced breakup of loss-bearing collective farms into private holdings in a radical new stage of land reform.

* Balancing the budget by cutting contributions to the Soviet government and subsidies to unprofitable factories; revamping the taxation system; instituting strict control over the burgeoning supply of rubles, and establishing a Russian customs system to stop the outflow of cheap Russian goods to other republics.

* Removal of the economic “iron curtain”--the bureaucratic and legal obstacles to broad Russian imports and exports--as well as the loosening of controls on converting rubles and on foreign investments.

In the brusque, tough style he is known for, Yeltsin let his audience know he would be merciless in pursuit of the reforms, proposing that the current Soviet Foreign Ministry be cut to one-tenth its present size and that he be given the authority to fire any local leader who blocked needed change.

And, if the other republics of the old Soviet Union do not go along with Russia’s plans, he said, “we won’t adjust ourselves to them. The time for marching in place has passed.”

Explaining the urgency of Yeltsin’s tone, adviser Sergei Stankevich said: “We tried all other possibilities and this is the only one left--a reformist breakthrough. It means fast, intensive and also unpopular measures.”

Vladimir Lysenko, leader of Russia’s Republican Party, compared Yeltsin to a political kamikaze, or suicide pilot, predicting that if the economic reforms fail, “not only will Yeltsin lose all authority but so will all the democratic leaderships in the country.”

Muscovites on the streets, although they said they recognize the need for tough reform, were already worrying Monday about their own budgets.

“I can hardly make ends meet now,” said pensioner Valentina Stanko, 67, as she stood in the strong wind that swirled the evening snow near the Garden Ring Road. “What will become of me and people like me in a few months?”

Mikhail Fishkin, a bus driver, observed: “I make more than 1,000 rubles a month ($571 at the commercial rate) now. If prices are freed and go up two or three times, I will have to make more than 2,000 rubles. Who will pay me that money, Yeltsin?

“But at the same time,” Fishkin acknowledged, “Things cannot go on as they were before--nothing to buy, no respect for the money we earn with our hard work.”

Among politicians at the congress, Yeltsin’s plan won enthusiastic public support from virtually all but the die-hard Communists.

Lev Ponomarev, a leader of the Democratic Russia movement, said the group plans to turn the local headquarters that it used during Yeltsin’s presidential campaign last spring into widespread centers for supporting the reforms.

And Nikolai Travkin, leader of the Democratic Party of Russia, said that it is a great relief to finally see Yeltsin turning the political momentum from his victory in August’s failed coup into a concrete plan. “Now at least we have a goal, and now we can start gathering public support behind this goal.”

To enhance his power enough to push through the reforms, Yeltsin will ask the congress to give him the right for one year to issue presidential decrees that would supersede even existing laws, provided the legislature does not veto them within 10 days, Stankevich said. Yeltsin also gained leverage on Monday when his candidate for the chairmanship of the congress, Ruslan Khasbulatov, was elected to the position.

Deputies predicted that Yeltsin will gain the extra powers he seeks.

“It is a dangerous road,” said Leonid Gurevich of Murmansk. “Deputies can see in this an attempt to destroy legislative power. But they will let him have it.”

If the congress falls in line behind Yeltsin as expected, he will then have to face one more obstacle: his own people. One Parliament economist predicted that the economy will reach its nadir in March or April, and others predicted rallies and possible strikes against the drop in the standard of living.

But “you cannot be afraid of that,” Stankevich said of the possibility of public disfavor and unrest. “You have to take the risk, the responsibility, and go forward.

“I am happy the president did it,” he added. “No one else could do it. It is the act of a real leader, a real Russian. He is going to the front of the firing line--as he always does at these times. This is a very Russian step.”