Yeltsin Threatens to Fire Russia Cabinet Ministers 🇷🇺

(26 Feb 1998) Russian/Eng/Nat

Russian president Boris Yeltsin has threatened three members of his government with dismissal for their poor performance last year.

But after one and a half hours of discussion, Yeltsin ended up leaving Thursday's cabinet session at the White House without firing anyone.

His speech has drawn a mixed reaction.

After a public dressing down of his government's performance last year, Russian President Boris Yeltsin told his government members that three amongst them would be dismissed for poor work.

At a long-promised session of the Russian government Yeltsin reviewed the work of his underlings for the past year.

He called them ineffective and disorganized.

But, by the end of the session, the cabinet remained intact.

Some government members were critical of Yeltsin's speech, others praised it and some were simply indifferent.

Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov said that Yeltsin's speech was nothing special and just a forum for him to shift the blame of his own poor policies.

SOUNDBITE: (Russian)
"In Russia there has always been the tradition that the Tsar would get rid of those under him so that they could be scapegoats. And of course Yeltsin is following in this tradition by getting rid of these government members, who they will be we don't know yet, but there
is nothing new from his speech he just simply went around the real problems."
SUPER CAPTION: Gennady Zyuganov, Leader of Russian Communist Party

Nationalist politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky said that Yeltsin's offer to sack three ministers was not enough, he called for a least 10 to be changed to make a difference in policy.

SOUNDBITE: (Russian)
"I think that it would be better to find even a few more new ministers to renew the government. We need stricter policy from the President, they are all too soft and indecisive and so therefore ineffective. If we changed ten ministers it would be a
movement ahead, but just to change three is an easy step. If they changed more ministers then by summer we would have a stronger government."
SUPER CAPTION: Vladimir Zhirinovsky, Leader of Liberal Democratic Party

And liberal politician Yegor Gaidar praised the course of reform of the Yeltsin government saying he hoped it would continue this year.

SOUNDBITE: (English)
"Of course there were problems and November and December of last year were not the best months but generally I hope the government will continue the work started previously."
SUPER CAPTION: Yegor Gaidar, Liberal Parliamentarian

Although Yeltsin said three government members would be fired at the end of the session he did not revealed their names.

Time will now tell who the trio will be.

Russia meanwhile will be waiting and watching closely.

APT

Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Archive
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/APArchives ​​
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/APNews/


You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/1c6e1a2a53060ef0458c0b07a309b634