Russian President Vladimir Putin, who will step down next year, may have a surprise choice for his preferred successor, state news agency RIA Novosti said on Friday, quoting a senior Kremlin aide. Putin is popular in Russia after seven years of strong economic growth.
His departure has fuelled concerns at home and abroad about potential hazards to Russia's political stability. Putin's support will be decisive for any candidate in the March 2008 elections but the president has said he will disclose his preferences only after the campaign kicks off in December. Analysts tend to view deputy prime ministers Sergei Ivanov and Dmitry Medvedev as the most likely successors.
"People keep talking about these two people as potential candidates, but my president may come out with one more surprise," RIA quoted Igor Shuvalov, Putin's envoy handling ties with the Group of Eight leading nations, as saying.
"Perhaps later this year you will learn about one more possible figure," added Shuvalov speaking late on Thursday in Washington where he is preparing Putin's visit to the United States, due to start on July 1.
The remarks from Shuvalov, whose position as an economic adviser places him within the Kremlin but outside the inner circle of trusted Putin confidantes, added to the air of mystery surrounding the identity of the likely future president.
Ivanov's high-profile appearances at a major international business and investment conference in St Petersburg last weekend increased speculation that he might be Putin's choice.
Despite pressure from allies, Putin has rejected the idea of redrawing the constitution to allow him a third consecutive four-year term, although he has spoken in favour of increasing tenure lengths to five or seven years for future leaders. "They are asking all the time if Putin is leaving indeed," Shuvalov said. "We constantly hear it from him, including in private conversations, that he will definitely leave."
Shuvalov said Putin did not want to be compared to other ex-Soviet leaders like Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko or late Turkmenistan leader Saparmurat Niyazov, who had changed their constitutions in order to stay on. "At the end of the day, Russian democracy will be judged when President Putin leaves without changing the constitution," Shuvalov said.
Putin's decision to promote his former chief of staff Medvedev and his defence minister Ivanov to the top government posts in the last several months has fuelled speculation that they were the prime candidates considered by the Kremlin leader. Speculation grew stronger after state-run media launched aggressive promotional campaign for the two ministers, who started making statements on political and foreign policy issues normally reserved for the president.
But suggestions that Putin, renowned for his love of covering political decision-making under the cloak of secrecy, may make a surprise choice have not ceased. Nor has speculation that the 54-year-old might return to fight the 2012 election.
Analysts name Kremlin chief of staff Sergei Sobyanin, the head of state company Russian Railways Vladimir Yakunin and St Petersburg governor Valentina Matviyenko among possible candidates for an interim presidency pending Putin's comeback.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Putin's support for a candidate in the presidential election will not affect the voters' right to exercise their choice. "He will use his right ... to give advice to those who will elect the president," RIA quoted him as saying. "But under our laws it will be the people who will have the final say."