Back to the Russian Front // Yeltsin Needs To Woo Voters

MOSCOW After securing promises of increased U.S. support for hisfaltering reform effort, President Boris N. Yeltsin now faces themuch more difficult task of convincing his own people that he holdsthe key to stability and prosperity in Russia.

As Yeltsin flew home from his summit with President Clinton inVancouver, Russians reacted to the announcement of a $1.6 billionU.S. economic assistance package with customary cynicism. Informalquestioning on the streets of Moscow suggested that few ordinaryRussians believe they will benefit from the agreements.

"The aid won't reach us," predicted Sergei Kvaschuk, 27, whobelongs to the newly emerging class of private entrepreneurs andsmall-business people directly targeted by the new U.S. aid program."Aid has never reached the people for whom it is intended in thepast, so why should we expect this time to be any different?"

"I think Yeltsin sincerely wants to help ordinary people, but heis surrounded by bureaucrats who want to fill their own pockets,"said Igor Osharin, 29, who recently opened his own private business,a motel for truck drivers. "If I were able to draw on these creditsfor my business, I would be willing to go to the barricades forYeltsin. But I doubt this will be the case."

Yeltsin has promised to mount an aggressive public relationscampaign to drum up support before a national referendum April 25 inwhich voters will be asked to express their confidence in thepresident and his reforms. Over the next three weeks, he plans totour the provinces to drive home his message that a "no" vote in thereferendum could lead to a "rollback to the past" and a "return tothe Communist yoke."

Leaders of the Communist and nationalist opposition lost no timein denouncing the latest aid package as a national humiliation for aonce-mighty superpower. They also accused Clinton and other Westernleaders of intervening in Russian internal affairs through what theydepicted as a ham-fisted attempt to boost Yeltsin's chances in thereferendum.

"This particular summit was just a propaganda campaign arrangedby the West," said Mikhail Astafyev, a nationalist politician whoheads the hard-line National Salvation Front. "We, the opposition,are naturally going to come to power very soon, and this propagandacampaign is going to complicate our relations with the UnitedStates."

While there is skepticism about the benefit of direct U.S. aidfor the country's collapsing economy, Russians may be moresusceptible to the television image of Yeltsin as the trustednegotiating partner of Western leaders. The Vancouver summitunderscored his standing as Russia's first popularly elected leader -a man who, for all his mistakes and miscalculations, is the guarantorof political stability in a potentially very unstable part of theworld.

"The summit is important psychologically," said Alexei Pushkov,deputy editor of the liberal weekly Moscow News. "It confirmsYeltsin's role as the only Russian leader whose authority isrecognized by the West. Russians have always paid a lot of attentionto the opinion of foreigners."