Kremlin Deal Undercuts Key Rival

During last month’s parliamentary elections, the Kremlin’s allies warned that a dangerous partnership could spring up between opposition leader Yevgeny M. Primakov and the Communist Party.

But when parliament’s lower house convened this week, the Kremlin’s first move was to cut its own deal with the Communists--and leave Primakov, a former prime minister, out in the cold.

A back-room agreement between the Communists and the Kremlin-backed Unity party to share power in the Duma has sparked what one rival leader said Wednesday was the first “parliamentary crisis” since tanks shelled the parliament building in 1993.

About 100 deputies--including members of a faction headed by Primakov--angrily boycotted Wednesday’s session of the Duma, a day after Unity helped install Communist Gennady N. Seleznyov as speaker.

Some pro-democracy advocates had hoped that acting President Vladimir V. Putin and Unity would relegate the Communists to a back seat in parliament. But for Putin, winning the March 26 presidential election transcends any ideological concerns.

Putin, a former KGB spy who has never run for office, has yet to reveal much of his philosophy or program. A strong nationalist who has relentlessly waged war against separatist rebels in the Russian republic of Chechnya, he has also talked of enacting “market reforms” that appeal to his liberal backers.

In a raw power play, Putin joined forces with the Communists to strengthen his own political position and keep Primakov--his most serious rival--at bay.

“I think what is happening now is profane,” Primakov told his fellow deputies. “It is real collusion, which will prevent the state Duma from working effectively in the future.”

The dispute highlights the realignment of political forces taking place in Russia in advance of the presidential election. Although Putin is almost certain to win, he and his allies are leaving nothing to chance.

Although the 94 Communist deputies make up the largest faction in the 450-seat Duma, the party poses little threat to Putin in the presidential race. The Kremlin is much more concerned about Primakov, who was Russia’s most popular politician before Putin arrived on the scene last summer.

For months now, the Kremlin and its allies have done everything they could to undercut Primakov, including ruthlessly attacking him in the parliamentary campaign through the media outlets they control.

Primakov, who has not yet said whether he will challenge Putin for the presidency, had let it be known that he wanted to be elected Duma speaker. If the Kremlin had not joined in backing Seleznyov, Primakov could well have won the high-profile post and used it as a base for challenging Putin in March.

Political analyst Andrei A. Piontkovsky, director of the Moscow-based Independent Institute for Strategic Studies, contends that Primakov was the victim of a Kremlin double cross.

“The Kremlin decided to kill Primakov in a most sadistic and cynical way,” Piontkovsky said. “I know that Primakov asked the Kremlin for the speaker’s job, and Putin promised to help him get it.”

The drama began to unfold Tuesday when the new Duma convened for its first session. Of the nine factions in the Duma, the pro-Putin Unity party is second after the Communists, with 81 seats.

Once it became clear that the two parties and their allies had sufficient votes to reelect Seleznyov, who had served as speaker in the previous Duma, Primakov and other candidates for speaker withdrew their names and left the hall, taking their supporters with them.

The boycott continued Wednesday as the Duma elected its remaining officers and committee chairs. Most of the key posts were handed out to Communist and Unity deputies--indicating that the power-sharing agreement is likely to hold for some time.

Unity leader Boris Gryzlov defended the alliance Wednesday, saying: “The cooperation with the [Communists] is essential for us to see our decisions implemented. Yesterday this cooperation was necessary to reach our objective.”

Grigory A. Yavlinsky, the leader of the liberal Yabloko party, who joined in the walkout, blamed Putin for creating the Duma standoff. “I firmly believe that the acting president is responsible for the fact that parliament is no longer able to function, that we have our first parliamentary crisis since 1993.”

Moscow Mayor Yuri M. Luzhkov, a Primakov ally, denounced the pact between Putin and the Communists as “one of the first signs of the upcoming Bolshevik dictatorship.”

Such dire warnings notwithstanding, Putin’s alliance with the Communists indicates that, most of all, he is a pragmatic politician for whom ideology is not a major concern.

The events in the Duma also demonstrate how tame the Communist Party has become in the eight years since the Soviet Union collapsed. No longer the party of fiery revolutionaries, it has settled into the role of self-appointed critic and parliamentary wheeler-dealer.

Seleznyov is known as a moderate politician who was able to compromise with the Kremlin when Boris N. Yeltsin was president. At times, he was criticized by fellow Communists for yielding too much to the Kremlin. When he ran for governor of the Moscow region in December--he lost a runoff this month--Putin endorsed him.

Perhaps Communist leader Gennady A. Zyuganov demonstrated best of all how soft the party has become when he lectured his rivals Wednesday on the meaning of democracy: “Those who call themselves democrats must fulfill state Duma decisions,” he said. “Slamming the door is a sign of lack of culture and of disrespect for colleagues, as well as for those who elected you.”