Bashkortostan Chief Defends Poll Win

By Bronwyn McLaren

The newly re-elected president of the republic of Bashkortostan on Tuesday dismissed allegations that he was behind the disqualification of his two main rivals at elections last week.

Murtaza Rakhimov won a convincing victory in the June 14 poll, returning for a second term as president of the republic of Bashkortostan, a region of 4 million people just west of the Ural Mountains.

But the results have been contested by three rivals who say Rakhimov pressured the local election commission to strike them off the ballot paper.

The Russian Supreme Court ruled a week before the elections that Rakhimov's two main rivals, Alexander Arinin and Rafis Kadyrov, had been struck off illegally. But the local election commission still refused to re-register the candidates citing other irregularities. This left as Rakhimov's only remaining opponent an unknown who was a junior minister in his government.

Brushing aside protests at a press conference Tuesday in Moscow, Rakhimov said the elections were completely fair and the election commission had acted legally. ``The elections went well'', he said.

Rakhimov said his two main rivals had been disqualified for submitting fake signatures in petitions required to register as candidates.

He said the 300,000 forged signatures were easy to detect because Bashkortostan has a social security card system, the only one of its kind in Russia. Each card bears the holder's signature and can be checked against data bases at the Interior Ministry and tax inspectorate.

Rakhimov also attacked his rivals for taking money from big business, naming BashPrombank and SBS-Agro as two of their campaign sponsors. Despite the controversy, Rakhimov was inaugurated for a second term as president on June 20 and President Boris Yeltsin has already offered his congratulations, suggesting the Kremlin does not intend to lodge a protest.

Rakhimov said there was no chance of Arinin or Kazakkulov being invited into his government. But he said he would be willing to meet with them for talks.

``Arinin is a talented guy'', he said. ``And he has five years of experience in the State Duma. He could be of great use in our Federal Assembly''.

Bashkortostan citizens should also expect no big policy changes from Rakhimov. ``I made no pre-election promises'', he said. ``I only said I would continue on the course I have set in motion. We need discipline and order''.

24 июня 1998г. The Moscow Times