Russia's First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, left, and President Vladimir Putin, right, attend the 8th Congress of United Russia.
Photo: Dmitry Azarov
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United Russia Manifests Generosity
The United Russia faction in the State Duma actually distributed all committees yesterday, giving six of 32 offices to minority factions. The ruling faction had grabbed all committees in the previous Duma.
Initially, United Russia didn’t plan to distribute the committees at its first plenary sitting slated for December 24, intending to elect only the speaker and vice speakers and focus on committees after the Christmas holidays.
But President Vladimir Putin broke the plans of the ruling faction. At December 17 Congress of the party, Putin demanded to hike salaries of budget employees and military on February 1. Executing this order of president requires passing a respective bill in the State Duma and amending the budget, which will take more than a single meeting.
The United Russia faction reasoned yesterday morning it would better sit December 26 and 28 in addition and set up all committees December 24. So, the faction of 315 members met in the afternoon, elected the chief, split into four groups and approved leaders of the lower house of parliament. Then, the party’s big names sat again, this time in Boris Gryzlov’s apartments, to distribute the portfolios.
In the previous State Duma, United Russia had lured independents to expand to the constitutional majority of over 300 members, concluded that “the winner gets all” and grabbed all 29 committees. This time, however, the party took into account the persistent advice of the Kremlin in general and of Vladimir Putin in particular and yielded a few offices to other factions.
It was ultimately decided to increase the number of committees from 29 to 32, offering six chairman positions to minority. So, the Communist Party will have the nationality committee and the industry committee and LDPR will chair the CIS committee and the youth committee. Fair Russia that had staked on the science and innovation technology committee will has to confine to the federation and regional policy committee and the committee on women affairs.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Dec. 19, 2007
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