St. Petersburg Mayor Loses Reelection Bid to Ex-Deputy

Anatoly A. Sobchak, the internationally popular mayor of St. Petersburg who tried to restore his city’s pre-Communist prominence as Russia’s “window on Europe,” lost his reelection bid to his deputy-turned-challenger in a tight race, a preliminary vote count showed Monday.

It was a major upset for a politician who had long been mentioned as a likely democratic successor to Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin and was viewed as a hero--second only to Yeltsin--for his efforts at foiling a hard-liners’ coup attempt against Mikhail S. Gorbachev in 1991.

But Russian politicians and analysts suggested that the expected passage of power from Sobchak to another reform-minded politician represents important proof that democracy is alive and well in Russia.

“Sobchak lost--so what? I don’t think we need to over-dramatize it,” said Lev A. Ponomarev, a leader of the Democratic Russia movement, which helped bring Yeltsin to power. “The people decided to replace him. This is what democracy is all about.”

Vladimir Yakovlev, 51, a former Sobchak deputy who waged his own campaign for the office that will change from mayor to governor with this election, won in a runoff by a slim two percentage points, according to preliminary calculations reported by Interfax news service. The Communist candidate lost resoundingly in the first round.

“We are definitely standing on a new threshold when democratic elections can bring about a peaceful transition of power,” Yakovlev said in an acceptance speech.

The apparent governor-elect of Russia’s second city quickly gave full endorsement to Yeltsin, who faces a tough reelection bid in two weeks, saying: “There are today no alternatives to Boris Yeltsin.”

In his concession speech, Sobchak, 58, compared his defeat to that of Winston Churchill.

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“People who got sick and tired of hard living and who came to believe the promises of the competitors rejected Churchill, the savior of the country, the symbol of victory,” Sobchak said, vowing to remain in politics.

Sobchak has long been criticized for corruption, elitism, mismanagement of the city’s reforms and excessive attention to foreign interests.

“Sobchak got too carried away by his ambitions to turn the city into an international center,” said Lyudmila V. Nikolayeva, a political advisor in St. Petersburg. “The public’s support for reforms has not decreased; the people just are sick and tired of waiting for Sobchak to turn his attention to the people instead of catering to the interests of foreign capital.”

While in office, Sobchak became a prominent figure internationally as he courted foreign investors to help refurbish St. Petersburg’s famous monuments and museums and aggressively pursued a bid to host the 2004 Olympics.

Sobchak was an obscure law professor before the 1989 elections for the Congress of People’s Deputies. He quickly became known across the country as a feisty, eloquent and reform-minded legislator as he took on the Communist Party chiefs of the Soviet government, the military and the KGB intelligence service in nationally televised parliamentary debates.

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When hard-liners tried to quash the Soviet Union’s infant democracy in a coup d’etat in August 1991, Sobchak’s reputation rose to hero status after he prevented troops from entering his city. He brought tens of thousands of supporters into the streets and threatened the regional military commander with a “Nuremberg prosecution” and the death penalty if troops were deployed in the city.

After he was elected mayor in June 1991, Sobchak set St. Petersburg, then still called Leningrad, on an ambitious reform path, attempting to make the city the cultural and financial capital of the country and its main gateway to the world.

St. Petersburg politicians said they do not expect Yakovlev to veer away from free market reforms, but they cautioned that he may not lead the city with the same priorities as Sobchak has. “I don’t think the course of reforms in St. Petersburg will be changed very much,” said Daniil A. Granin, a pro-reform writer in St. Petersburg.

Granin did suggest that Yakovlev, a former construction engineer and manager, may not give adequate attention to St. Petersburg’s cultural heritage. “I’m afraid St. Petersburg will be turned into a gigantic factory and will cease to be a cultural center of Russia,” he said.