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Fatigue forced resignation: Yeltsin
05/10/2000 14:37 - (SA)
Moscow - Boris Yeltsin decided to drop his "political bombshell" and resign
as president last New Year's Eve because he was "very tired,"
according to extracts from the former Russian leader's upcoming
memoirs published on Wednesday.
"I told my secretary to summon Putin at 9.30. I opened the red file
containing the resignation documents ... Thank God! I signed
feeling relieved and satisfied," Yeltsin wrote, referring to his
then-prime minister Vladimir Putin.
"I looked over at Putin. He remained impassive, smiling nervously.
I shook his hand and told him 'congratulations'," wrote Yeltsin in the book, extracts of which appeared in Wednesday's
edition of the Argumenty i Fakti weekly.
"Now I no longer have responsibility for the nuclear codes. Maybe I
will suffer less from insomnia?", he wrote.
As the president left the Kremlin, feeling "tired, very tired," he
noticed "how white the snow is in the Kremlin." When US President
Bill Clinton rang, Yeltsin told him to call back later.
The only person informed of his decision, a full two weeks before
the announcement, was Putin, who went on to succeed Yeltsin in the
Kremlin.
The third and "definitive" volume of the memoirs relates to "the
search for a strong politician, capable of taking the mantle,
pursuing the reforms and reinforcing the strength of the State,"
said Yeltsin during an interview on Wednesday.
"That man was called Vladimir Putin," he said.
"I don't think I'm ready for this decision Boris Nikolayevich,"
Putin was quoted as saying on 14 December when the Russian leader
broke his news.
Yeltsin graciously called his dauphin's reluctance the "doubts of a
strong man," adding that he told his future replacement that he too
"would have liked to live my life differently."
The decision to quit taken, Yeltsin said he worked out with Putin a
"joint plan" to resign and hand over power.
"I have always enjoyed making decisions alone," wrote Yeltsin,
adding that his family and chief advisers only found out about the
decision at the very last moment.
However, he noted, they were used to his "character, his
improvisations and surprises."
Yeltsin's resignation catapulted Putin, who headed the domestic
intelligence service until he was plucked from obscurity by Yeltsin
to become prime minister, into the Kremlin as acting president. He
was elected to the office several months later.
- Sapa-AFP
- SAPA
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