Yeltsin Rebukes Russia’s Local Officials : Government: He says their squabbling, corruption and abuse of authority are weakening the nation.

Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin read the riot act to a gathering of lawmakers and executive officials from across his vast country Friday, ordering them to stop their local squabbles because they threaten to choke his reforms.

“The people will never forgive us if the hardships they are going through turn out to be in vain, if reforms fail to bring about positive results only because of disputes between the two branches of power, especially at the local level,” Yeltsin said.

He accused local officials of corruption, of “weakening Russia’s nascent statehood” by ignoring his decrees and government resolutions and of violating the constitution and Russian laws. “As a result, the Russian Federation as a whole and its regions, and all Russian citizens, have suffered considerable moral and material losses,” Yeltsin scolded.

Yeltsin’s reproach--at a first-of-a-kind meeting of legislative and executive leaders from across the country in the central Russian city of Cheboksary--brought to light the chaotic situation in local governments across the country.

“Especially intolerable is the discord in the work of the representative and executive branches on all levels,” Yeltsin said. “What previously seemed like a small glitch in the mechanism of state management can now become a serious obstacle in implementing the reforms.”

Yeltsin accused regional legislatures and city councils of interfering in the everyday affairs of executive bodies and scolded mayors and chief administrators for assuming lawmaking powers.

Admitting that some of the blame is his because the new structure of local governments he introduced a year ago has failed, Yeltsin said a new system has to be designed.

“We’ve staged an experiment and we’ve seen it didn’t work well,” he said. “There is a need now to start a reform of local self-government without delay.”

Yeltsin, who won his popularity by battling corruption and privilege of the former Communist Party leadership, said the new local officials are similarly abusing their authority. In a change from their powers under the Soviet Union, when all foreign trade went through Moscow, local officials now have direct access to foreign markets, and specific regions have been given special tax breaks and other favorable conditions to attract foreign partners.

Only 3% of the money local regions have earned has been used for food. Another 8%-10% has gone to develop local industry. But all the rest has been used to pay for foreign travel, foreign cars and “miscellaneous” expenses for the officials, Yeltsin said.

Before their peers, Yeltsin exposed local officials who had tried to coerce him into certain actions.

“There are some examples, for instance, (Yuri A.) Nozhikov--I hope he is here today. He is head of Irkutsk regional administration,” Yeltsin said. “He sent me a written warning that said: ‘Unless you privatize the energy sector I will dismiss you from your post without further warning.’ ”

The crowd burst into laughter at the absurdity of the threat.

Officials in some regions, such as the industrial city of Tomsk, have decided that they are exempt from the difficult reforms that the rest of the country is undergoing to forge a market economy, he said. Instead, they revert to the old Soviet ways of controlling prices and restricting free enterprise.

These local authorities trying to “live on an island of so-called developed socialism” will have to answer to their voters, Yeltsin added.

Yeltsin stressed that he would not allow his country to break up into fiefs controlled by local leaders who use “guerrilla tactics” to avoid their financial responsibilities to the federal government.