MOSCOW, February 26 (Itar-Tass) — The Russian president should reserve the right to dismiss elected governors, Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on the Rossiya-1 television channel on Saturday.
“It is necessary to reserve for the president the right to dismiss governors, no matter how they were elected heads of RF subjects.” The mayor explained that the head of state should take advantage of this right “if a person who although has not broken the law, stole nothing, but cannot manage the region, which happens very often, takes this post (of governor).” “Imagine a person elected for five years, who is ruining the region little by little, and nobody can do anything with him – the recall mechanism is rather complicated, so the president should always be given the right to remove such a person, not only because of the law violation, but also, in essence, because of ruining the work,” the mayor said, adding that “the people will then again decide whom to elect.”
Sobyanin also believes it necessary to introduce certain “filters” – “we will have many people willing to be elected. Among them there will be people with dubious past, adventurers, people who are connected with criminals.” “I think that at least for the first time the president should have some kind of a filter. After some time it will become no longer necessary,” Sobyanin said.