Putin pledges to support protégé as successor
Medvedev, 42, is considered relative liberal
MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin said yesterday that he will support first deputy prime minister Dmitry Medvedev as president, ending years of speculation about his choice and all but ensuring that his longtime associate and young protégé will succeed him in the Kremlin next year.
"I have known him very closely for more than 17 years and I completely and fully support this proposal," said Putin, speaking to the leaders of four political parties, including the ruling United Russia party, who said they would nominate Medvedev as their candidate.
Medvedev, 42, a lawyer by training who is also chairman of the energy giant Gazprom, is regarded as a relative liberal among the constellation of political factions in the Kremlin. Unlike many in Putin's immediate circle, he has no background in the KGB or the security services. He is believed to be open to constructive relations with the West and greater political pluralism at home.
"It's a signal to the West that we want to continue communication and cooperation," said Igor Bunin, head of the Center for Political Technologies in Moscow, in an interview. "There won't be any radical changes in his presidency, but I believe Medvedev will be milder than Putin. He will largely follow the course set by Putin, but he is more oriented towards the Western model, building a democratic tradition."
Medvedev owes his political life to Putin, and the two are said to have a father-son relationship, according to Olga Kryshtanovskaya, director of the Moscow-based Center for the Study of Elites.
"It's almost a monarchial succession," she said in an interview. "He nominated his 'adopted' son."
Formally, Medvedev was nominated by United Russia and three other parties that informed Putin of their decision yesterday.
"The next four years should pass under the slogan of improving living standards," said Boris Gryzlov, speaker of the lower house of parliament and head of the United Russia party. "Medvedev is the most socially oriented of all possible candidates."
But, despite the political theater of the parties presenting their choice to the president, the decision was always Putin's alone.
With the backing of his longtime sponsor, Medvedev, who has never been elected to any political office, will almost certainly coast to victory in the March 2 elections. Most Russians have told pollsters that they will back the president's choice. And the full retinue of state power, including control of broadcast media, will be deployed to ensure victory for Medvedev against a likely fragmented field of weak candidates.
Kryshtanovskaya said Medvedev's dependence on Putin also means that he will enter the presidency a weak figure. Putin will play a major role as adviser and protector while the elite reconcile themselves to a candidate who was not their first choice, she said.
The choice of Medvedev, however, is unlikely to end speculation that Putin will ultimately return to the presidency.
"If Putin wants to return in two, three years . . . Medvedev will be the person who will without a doubt give up the path for him," opposition politician Vladimir Ryzhkov said on Ekho Moskvy radio yesterday.
But Bunin argued that "he will be a real president. He is not a keeper of Putin's seat. Of course, he will not be as powerful as Putin, at least not in his first term."
Medvedev's star, which was considered high earlier in the year, appeared to have faded in recent weeks.
Speculation about Putin's successor had focused on two perceived hard-liners - the newly appointed prime minister, Viktor Zubkov, and another first deputy prime minister and former KGB agent, Sergey Ivanov.
But Putin, in the end, turned not only to a trusted adviser but the one with whom he has the closest personal bond, a man he addresses with the diminutive, Dima.
"Let's agree that there is such a thing as comradeship," said Putin in a book-length interview called "First Person," published at the start of his first term. "I get that feeling with Dima Medvedev."
Both of them hail from St. Petersburg, and they first worked together in the city administration there in the early 1990s. Putin headed the city's committee on external relations, where Medvedev was a legal consultant.
"President Putin trusts him entirely," said Valery Musin, one of Medvedev's former law professors who also served with him as one of Putin's legal advisers in St. Petersburg. "They are very close."
Musin, in an interview yesterday, described Medvedev as "very communicative with a very good sense of humor. He is flexible but firm enough to persuade you of this line. He is young, but very capable and, most important, has gained enough experience to serve in this position."
The only child of university professors, Medvedev entered Leningrad State University, also Putin's alma mater, in 1982. He eventually earned a doctorate in law.
Medvedev, who is married with an 11-year-old son, taught law at the university until 1999, when Putin, then prime minister, brought him to Moscow as deputy head of the government administration.
Within a month, President Boris Yeltsin resigned and Putin was propelled into the Kremlin. Medvedev went with him as deputy head of the administration, and he also headed Putin's first election campaign in 2000.
Three years later, Medvedev became head of the presidential administration.
In November 2005, Medvedev left the presidential administration to become first deputy prime minister. 