Fresh questions were raised about the health of Russia's body politic yesterday after a convicted criminal nicknamed "Winnie the Pooh" became mayor of the far-eastern city of Vladivostok.
Vladimir Nikolayev, 30, a wealthy businessman with convictions for assault and threatening murder, won the mayoral contest in themafia-ridden port city in extraordinarily dubious circumstances.
His closest rival, a former Vladivostok mayor called Viktor Cherepkov, 62, "tripped" on a powerful grenade placed outside his office days before last Sunday's crucial vote and remains in hospital.
He suffered concussion, partial loss of speech, a heart attack and temporary deafness and his supporters claimed that he had been targeted for assassination.
In the first round of voting he had come second only to Nikolayev, polling 26.3 per cent of the vote against the businessman's 26.8 per cent.
Shortly before his "accident" he had gone on TV to urge voters not to let the city of 700,000 people "be taken over" by criminal forces. Nikolayev denies any involvement in the attack and insists he has no links with the criminal underworld.
Izvestia said: "For the first time in Russia a man with a criminal past has become head of a major region. He [Nikolayev] is a local figure nicknamed Winnie the Pooh with a criminal record that is studied by local law students in their textbooks."
Many politicians condemned the election out of hand, some urging the Kremlin to annul the results and assume direct control of the region from Moscow. A deputy in the local Parliament representing President Vladimir Putin's party, United Russia, Nikolayev owns some of the region's biggest seafood, meat-processing and timber firms and is extremely wealthy.
Russian media reported widespread "irregularities", voters apparently being bribed to vote for Nikolayev with cash, lottery tickets and cheap fish and sausages.
Drunks and tramps were also allegedly bussed to polling booths to ensure he won more than the 50 per cent of votes he needed for the election to be legal.
A colourful past
* In 1999 a court sentenced Vladimir Nikolayev to 3 1/2 years in prison for beating a local official and threatening to kill another. He served 18 months before being released as part of a general amnesty.
* Russian media reported yesterday that he had been involved in shoot-outs and dabbled in extortion.
* The daily Izvestia said he had been a key player in Vladivostok's infamously murky criminal underworld where he was known as "Winnie the Pooh".
