Vladimir Putin: Rise and rise of Russian leader as he marks 20 years at the helm

Russian President Vladimir Putin achieved a major landmark of 20 years at the helm, on May 7, 2020, involving in a tremendous change witnessed by the former Soviet state. The former KGB officer was serving as the Prime Minister when President Boris Yeltsin abruptly resigned on December 31, 1999, naming Putin as acting President amid pending elections.

Putin won his first presidential election on March 26, 2000, by a slim margin but suffered a blow to his image within months due to the sinking of the Russian submarine Kursk in the Barents Sea. The submarine had a crew of 118 members onboard and no one survived the accident. The Russian President’s first comments came after four days of the accident and denied delays in rescue operation.

The first term of Putin’s presidency was marred with controversies related to Chechen militants and the arrest of Oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky whose supporters said it was nothing but the punishment of meddling in politics. However, Putin came back for a second term in 2004 with an overwhelming majority on the back of oil prices boom leading to the rise in living standards.

In a step to centralise the power, Putin scrapped direct elections for regional governors, paving the way for Kremlin to decide on appointees. While his regime brought social stability and economic progress, it came at the cost of press freedom and democracy at large, something his critics deemed indispensable. 

In 2006, investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya, a strong critic of human rights abuses in Chechnya, was killed in Moscow and another critic Alexander Litvinenko died in London after reportedly being poisoned with a radioactive substance. An inquiry by UK authorities later found out that Litvinenko was murdered by Russian spies.

Putin had to step down from the presidential position due to the constitutional limitations on more than two consecutive terms, but the Russian leader chose to serve as Prime Minister and his ally Dmitry Medvedev became the President. He returned as President after winning the elections in 2012 with Constitutional amendment now increasing president's term of office from four to six years.

Russia joins WTO

One of the major achievement of Putin came as Russia’s formal joining on the World Trade Organisation (WTO) after 18 years of rigorous negotiations. Russia also successfully hosted the Winter Olympic Games in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. In the biggest East-West showdown in the post-Soviet era, Russian forces annexed Crimea from Ukraine and a referendum upheld the annexation to join Russia.

In 2018, Putin was re-elected with a landslide victory with a mandate to stay in the office until 2024 but the latest sweeping reforms have given the Russian leader an option to run for two more terms. The proposal was sent to the Russian Constitutional Court which cleared it to let Putin stay in power beyond term limits. The referendum on the proposal was set to be held on April 22 but was postponed due to the rising cases of coronavirus in the country.

Read: Russia Passes Bill Allowing Putin To Stay In Power Past 2024

(Image: AP)