Yeltsin Foe Pledges Coalition Rule
By David Hoffman
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, June 25 1996; Page A12
MOSCOW, June 24 -- Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov launched an apparent last-ditch effort to broaden his political base today by announcing that if elected president next week he would form a government comprising all of Russia's competing political forces.
But rivals immediately declared they would not participate, including Mayor Yuri Luzhkov of Moscow and free-market economist Grigory Yavlinsky, head of the Yabloko party, who finished fourth in the first round of the election.
Lacking funds for a concluding campaign swing, Zyuganov will remain in Moscow for the final 10 days before the July 3 runoff ballot against President Boris Yeltsin. He kicked off his endgame strategy by calling a news conference at the parliament building but refused to take questions, inviting reporters to come to another news conference on Tuesday.
Instead, Zyuganov outlined a vague initiative stipulating that if elected he would first call for the signing of a "pact of national accord" among Russia's warring political interests. Then, he said, he would create a council made up of many political, economic, religious and ethnic forces that would put together a coalition government. A third of the coalition members would come from Zyuganov's supporters, a third from the "current government" and a third from other blocs.
Zyuganov's declaration was the latest signal from the Communists that they are worried about their inability to expand their constituency, which is essential if Zyuganov is to defeat Yeltsin in the runoff.
Zyuganov won 24.2 million votes in the first round on June 16, compared to 26.6 million for Yeltsin. To win next week, he must compete for the 23.7 million voters who cast their ballots for neither of them. Yeltsin made a bold pitch for these voters last week by appointing the third-place finisher, retired Lt. Gen. Alexander Lebed, to a top Kremlin security post and firing four hawkish lieutenants.
Zyuganov is "trying to take the centrists in the electorate and show them that he's not so terrible," said political commentator Sergei Chugayev in an interview. "Last week, he was silent and defensive. Now he wants to do something and stimulate activity; he wants to win the centrists. He wants to show he can be president of all the country."
But his gambit seemed to fall flat within hours of the announcement. Zyuganov said "talks are underway" with several prominent regional politicians, including Mayor Luzhkov, who was reelected last week with more than 90 percent of the vote. But Luzhkov said brusquely through his spokesman that he "categorically rejects" any offers from Zyuganov for a high-ranking Kremlin post.
Asked about Zyuganov's proposal, Yavlinsky, whose pro-reform voters are among those being courted, told reporters: "I really think that Zyuganov fears very much a defeat at the polls. He has every reason to fear." Yavlinsky said his party decided at a weekend meeting that it would not support Zyuganov and would support Yeltsin only if he met certain conditions.
Zyuganov said at his news conference that "negotiations [on the coalition] have already been held" with 12 ministers and 29 deputy ministers in Yeltsin's government, none of whom he named. Zyuganov also named a group of his own supporters who would be in the coalition.
Despite the emphasis on compromise, Zyuganov's remarks also included his standard demands for more government subsidies for industry and agriculture. He also borrowed Lebed's favorite themes, calling for reform of the army and a crackdown on crime.
There was, however, one difference from his past statements. Previously, Zyuganov has said there are only three "traditional" religions in Russia -- the Russian Orthodox Church, Islam and Buddhism and that "foreign" clergy should be barred from the country. Today, when describing his proposed national council, Zyuganov said it would include Jews, and he called for a peaceful end to all "hotbeds of nationalism, separatism, antisemitism and chauvinism."
But Zyuganov was rebuffed indirectly by the patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, Alexei II, who said the church is "not indifferent" to the election, considering the expansion of religious freedom in Russia over the last five years under Yeltsin .
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