Yeltsin Rips Up His ‘Needs Improvement’ Economic Report Card

Handed an economic report card reading “Needs Improvement” on most points, Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin’s Cabinet fought back hard Thursday at a pivotal session of Parliament that would determine its future.

The Congress of People’s Deputies continued to mull over exactly how it would show its dissatisfaction with Yeltsin’s economic reforms, either by stripping Yeltsin of some of his special powers, forcing him to appoint a new prime minister or requiring him to reorganize the government.

But the Yeltsin administration was already launching a powerful counteroffensive, with economics chief Yegor T. Gaidar, normally a dry speaker, lashing out at critics who accused his staff of heartlessness and incompetence.

“Maybe our government has made a mistake in creating the image of a government of technocrats who care most about the market and a deficit-free budget,” he said. “I would like to assure you, esteemed deputies, that this government consists of people who hold Russia as dear to their hearts as you do.”

With his emotional speech and insistence that the government would simply collapse if it tried to please everyone, Gaidar even won warm applause from the nearly 1,000 deputies--a rarity for the economics wizard whom many Russians blame for their radical drop in living standards this year.

Despite the applause, however, the deputies remained firm in their own insistence that the government needs major changes in its reform policy. It was expected to vote today on a resolution detailing its demands.

Even Democratic Russia, the organization that includes Yeltsin’s main backers, proposed that the government be censured for falling short in several areas:

* Providing funds for children, pensioners, the handicapped and the poor.

* Splitting apart collective farms into more efficient private ones.

* Selling government property to private owners.

* Stemming the drop in industrial production.

* Breaking up monopolies.

* Removing old Communist Party officials from the bureaucracy.

Gaidar admitted to some shortcomings, but he also argued forcefully that no Cabinet could run the economy any better and that the country could end up “changing governments like gloves.”

Few deputies actually called for the Cabinet’s full resignation, but it was clear that Yeltsin would be forced to pay a political price.

Yeltsin’s aides, worried that his special powers to rule by decree would be revoked, warned that if that happens, the still-popular Russian president would “appeal to the people” by initiating a referendum and calling for new elections.

The Cabinet also decided that if Yeltsin is forced to resign as prime minister, its members will all quit, too, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Shokhin reportedly said.