Russian Political Corruption
Without honest and effective political leadership, though, prosperity for the great majority will remain an elusive hope. Given its record so far, the government of President Boris Yeltsin can hardly be expected to provide the needed guidance and direction.
During last year's election Russian banks directed substantial resources to favored political candidates. While some backed the national-patriotic and Communist candidates, those who supported Yeltsin were rewarded. Thus, when Yeltsin formed his new post-election administration he appointed Vladimir Potanin, the 35-year-old president and co-founder of the country's biggest private bank, Oneksim Bank, as first vice premier for economics.
Because Yeltsin owes his July 1996 reelection victory in large measure to the financial and media support of Russia's new plutocrats, his government is widely disdained as an instrument of alien interests. Although many former Communist Party officials (including Yeltsin himself), as well as former KGB functionaries, continue to occupy high-level positions in Russia.
Opposing Yeltsin and his adherents is a diverse array of nationalists: national communists, national socialists, and national capitalists. In general, they call for a healthy, nationally-conscious Russian folk capable of defending and restoring the nation's dangerously dissipated ethnic and cultural character. [See: E. Zündel, "My Impressions of the New Russia," Sept.-Oct. 1995 Journal, pp. 2-8.]