Russian President Vladimir Putin has come up with a novel way to fight corruption. In one of the first major reforms of his second term, Putin has raised his own salary and those of his ministers by up to five times.
Bribe-taking is rife among the army of bureaucrats who retain a stranglehold on Russian business and society.
Yet a presidential move to stem this damaging influence on the country's pride and economic development has started with incentives at the top.
The Kremlin head has not made performance-related pay part of his agenda before.
But yesterday the Russian media reported that he signed a decree on April 10 increasing the salaries of about 10 percent of federal officials.
The respected business daily Vedomosti said the decree "on the improvement of labor wages" for state servants gave Putin a 100-percent pay rise. His wages last year were 70,000 rubles [US$2,445] a month but will this year amount to about 146,000 rubles.
Ministers' salaries will rise five times, and some departmental heads will receive 12 times their present paychecks.
Although a report appeared in Rossiskaya Gazeta, the state newspaper, a Kremlin spokeswoman declined to give "official confirmation" to the reports.
Vladimir Pribylovsky, president of the Panorama think tank, said, "This reform won't appear on state TV or be declared loudly. When Yeltsin increased his salary, it was done by a secret decree."
Before his re-election campaign last month, Putin declared his entire capital assets at about 8 million roubles, as well as two small flats, some shares and a field near Moscow. He will now earn a sixth of US President George W. Bush's salary and a fifth of British Prime Minister Tony Blair's.
As Russia bristles at the eastward expansion of NATO and the EU, he will be able to say he earns 50 percent more than the president of the Baltic accession state of Estonia.
His new prime minister, Mikhail Fradkov, has repeatedly said that bureaucracy would be cut -- perhaps by a fifth -- and that those remaining would receive higher wages. But the pay rises have yet to lower the head count, raising fears that Putin's favored strengthening of the state will simply raise the burden on the taxpayer.
Pribylovsky said that most bureaucrats, who receive low salaries of about US$304 a month, benefit hugely from the array of privileges granted to them. At the high end, these include free flats worth millions, chauffeur-driven cars with government plates and other perks.
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