BELGOROD. Sept 13 (Interfax-AVN) - Russian President Vladimir Putin has explained the recent resignation of the government by the need to set a certain vector for the executive branch's development and ensure its uninterruptible and trouble-free functioning before the parliamentary and presidential elections and after them.
"I expect that all these steps will make people concentrate more on performing their service duties, and that the entire power and governance system in Russia will function faultlessly both before and after the elections the 2007-2008 elections. This is the main motive," Putin told journalists during a visit to the Belgorod region.
Putin recalled that he had said in his address to the Federal Assembly earlier this year that all government officials, regardless of the results of the elections to the State Duma and presidential elections in March 2008, "are supposed to work as hard as they can up to the last minute."
"But appeals are one thing and reality is another. We are all people, and we all have some plans for our future. Of course, it is quite difficult to concentrate, bearing in mind that there is some uncertainty as regards what is going to happen to each particular person and how the system of power and governance is going to be built in the country following these events," Putin said.
"I deemed it appropriate to get rid of all these issues, as was done in 2004, just before the presidential elections," he said.
"It is better to make some personnel decisions and take necessary steps from the viewpoint of modernizing the governance system itself now so as to avoid faults involved in major reshuffles and set a vector of the development and construction of the administrative and executive branch in the period after the elections," Putin said.