Vyacheslav Volodin, whom Putin nominated as the new speaker of the State Duma, oversaw this month’s parliamentary election in which the main party supporting Putin tightened its grip on the lower house.
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The leaders of the parties – United Russia, the Communist Party, Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR), and A Just Russia – expressed their support for Volodin at the meeting.
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union should have transformed the bloc into a democratic entity rather than see it collapse, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said.
The decision to tap Volodin is part of a broad reshuffle of Russia’s ruling elite ahead of a presidential election due in March 2018, in which Putin is eligible to seek a new six-year term. Volodin replaces Sergei Naryshkin, whom Putin named the new chief of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service.
Putin drew Zyuganov’s attention to the fact it was the Communist Party that was running the country at the moment, and not some other party that might be advancing the ideas of nationalism or other destructive ideas, ruinous for any state, let alone such a multi-ethnic country as Russian Federation.
Dmitry Gudkov, an opposition politician who served in the previous Duma, said that the new job would give Volodin higher visibility and could be a sign that he’s being groomed to succeed Putin in the future. Among other responsibilities, the SVR is tasked with providing intelligence to the Russian president and government, as well as to both parliamentary chambers.
The announcement came as the latest in a series of changes at the top of Russia’s power structure, most notably the departure of longtime ally Sergei Ivanov as the Kremlin’s chief of staff.
The governing United Russia party gained 343 seats in the 450-seat State Duma in the September 18 elections.
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Russian Federation annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in March 2014 following a contested referendum.
