A former ally of the Prime Minister has led a parliamentary walk-out to prevent any further legislation being passed until a ‘consensus’ on government policy can be reached.
Krill Serbin, the Communications and Media Minister, said the government was in ‘chaos’. Until last year the minister was a strong supporter of Prime Minister Gruaman, but suggested that this afternoon’s reading of the foreign trade and regulations bill was ‘disastrous’ and led to the government being defeated by opposition leaders from the Union Party.
Centrist leaders had feared a backlash to their decision to allow members of the United Nationalist Democrats to sit in government, but a source close to the Prime Minister said that the outcome of today’s sitting in parliament was ‘far worse’ than expected. The Minister responsible for the bill, Yevgeniy Kalandarshivilli, is reported to be ‘furious’ with rebel members who voted against the government and as such prompted the controversial legislation to fall.
Tonight the formal opposition led calls for the Prime Minister’s resignation. In the lower-house their spokesperson Lazar Ulanov said the government ‘could no longer be trusted with the keys to our economy’. But the absence of the party’s leader, Gennadiy Artamova, caused many commentators to suggest they were ‘underwhelmed’ by the oppositions attack on the government – particularly as rebels from Gruaman’s own party led a walk-out.
The 34 members of the Centrists who left the lower-house, largely from the party’s more conservative wing, immediately after the first part of the bill fell, issued a joint statement aimed at the Prime Minister.
Jointly, they criticised Gruaman’s leadership and said they were ‘furious’ that the leadership had invited ‘untested and untrusted’ United Nationalist Democrat members into the government.
‘It is a crisis of leadership, not of government’ the statement read and Mr Serbin, the most influential member of the more nationalist wing of the party, is thought to be considering following the former Deputy Prime Minister in resigning from government and suggested that he could force Gruaman into a leadership contest. Speaking to journalists outside Parliament Square in Karasicena he said, ‘I’m inclined to believe that the Prime Minister does not have the confidence of his own members,’ any such vote would likely prompt further calls from the Union Party for an immediate election.
The Prime Minister, who was looking to consolidate his position later this week by being confirmed as the Centrists nominee for October’s presidential election, now faces a crisis of his government and leadership.
Mr Gruaman faced a similar challenge last year when his former executive colleague Lena Zilberman announced she would run against Gruaman for the Centrist nomination. An aide close to Ms Zilberman, who left the executive following a miscarriage, said that the Prime Minister had ‘missed a decisive opportunity’ to ‘rid the executive of his enemies’.
The Centrists new partner in government, the United Nationalist Democrats tonight said that their members had supported the government, and that the ‘responsibility to end this crisis’ is now that of the Prime Minister.
Mr Gruaman is yet to release a statement following today’s events, but is due to give his weekly press conference tomorrow morning. He left parliament earlier, attempting to avoid press gathered outside.
Mr Ulanov had the final words in the lower-house before Deputy Prime Minister Ida Korneev ended the session. ‘We cannot afford many more wasted days like this’ Mr Ulanov suggested, ‘I think it’s time the Prime Minister realises it is over.’
