A Political Consensus Has Been Reached, but the Economy Is As Bad As It Was Yevgeny Primakov will become a reliable cover for the unknown vice Premier, who will really manage the economy Nezavisimaya Gazeta 09/11/98 Yevgeny Primakov's nomination as prime minister was a strong political move by President Boris Yeltsin. Primakov is an outstanding diplomat and one of the strongest foreign ministers in the world. His diplomatic achievements are so great that he is sometimes called the "Russian Churchill." However, his economic views are hardly well developed, because he has never been a professional economist, the daily noted. Primakov is a complete contrast to his predecessor, Sergei Kiriyenko, who had economic experience but lacked political weight. Nezavisimaya wrote that Primakov's great intuition can help him find the right decisions. Besides, all the "dirty work" will be performed by his first deputy prime minister, or a whole bunch of deputies brought from various political parties. The daily wrote that candidates for the post of first deputy premier including acting deputy prime minister Boris Fyodorov, Communist Yury Maslyukov, Yabloko leader Grigory Yavlinsky and former Prime Minister Victor Chernomyrdin. They all have very different economic programs, ranging from Yavlinsky's liberal economy to the purely monetarist program of Fyodorov and the command economy program of Maslyukov. The daily concluded that Primakov will have to make his choice, based on political compromise. -- Gregory Schwartz Department of Political Science York University 4700 Keele St. Toronto, Ontario M3J 1P3 Canada Tel: (416) 736-5265 Fax: (416) 736-5686 Web: http://www.yorku.ca/dept/polisci
