Moscow - Dmitry Medvedev was sworn in as Russian president on Wednesday in a glittering Kremlin ceremony and immediately nominated his predecessor Vladimir Putin as prime minister, launching an uncertain era of joint rule.
After taking the oath in the Kremlin's gold-leafed Great Palace, Medvedev, 42, said his most important task was to ensure "civil and economic freedom" and to strengthen Russia's role on the international stage.
His first act as president was to name Putin, the outgoing president and Medvedev's long-time boss, prime minister - an arrangement analysts say could allow Putin to be the true leader.
Putin underlined his influence by opening the Kremlin ceremony, attended by more than 2 000 members of Russia's elite, with a call for "everyone together to continue the course that has already been taken" during his eight years in power.
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The current premier, Viktor Zubkov, resigned immediately after the ceremony.
Medvedev has risen from obscurity as a Putin-era bureaucrat to become the third post-Soviet president, commander-in-chief of a vast nuclear arsenal and leader of the world's largest energy producer.
He inherits a booming economy fuelled by massive oil and gas exports, and a country at its most confident since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.
However, the mild-mannered lawyer, who has never before held elected office, will have to grapple with turbulent relations with the West, unbridled corruption and politically explosive price rises. As recently as Tuesday, the government approved big hikes in utility prices, with gas going up by 29 percent and electricity by 17 percent.
On the eve of the inauguration, dozens of activists were arrested for trying to stage a rare anti-Kremlin rally.
Medvedev, whose March 2 election landslide was criticised by independent monitors as partly staged, will also have to deal with Putin looking over his shoulder.
Putin has made clear that he will transform the premiership, currently a technocratic post, into a second centre of power.
Although the former KGB agent was barred by the constitution from seeking a third consecutive presidential term, he is only 55 and could run again in 2012, or before, if Medvedev were to leave office early. - Sapa-AFP
- This article was originally published on page 6 of The Mercury on May 08, 2008
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