KOMMERSANT (Russia)
MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin made official his control of state-controlled corportations and information outlets, including major telecommunications companies. Although Putin has informally had the power to control the top management at these companies, the companies will now formally have to answer to him and his administration, Kommersant reported.
The change came about when Putin went from being Prime Minister to President. Officially, the state-owned corporations are controlled by Parliament, with the Prime Minister the head of the legislative body. That arrangement worked perfectly well for Putin when he was Prime Minister, but when he relinquished the post prior to his reelection as president, he found that he no longer had the veto power for top management appointments that he had grown accustomed to. He appears to have found that unacceptable.
In general, the change in law will not mean any changes for the state-owned corporations. In fact, it is a sort of protection against change. Prime Minister Dimitry Medvedev’s government didn’t have time to use its short-lived opportunity to change any of the managers at these major companies - and now it has lost the opportunity to do so in the future, Kommersant reports.
