Russian President Vladimir Putin does not rule out that he will run as a presidential candidate for a new term if the corresponding amendment to the constitution is adopted. The head of state said this during the broadcast of the program “Russia: Kremlin: Putin” on the Rossiya-1 television channel, TASS reports.
“I personally have not yet decided, but I do not rule out the possibility of running, if it is stipulated by the constitution. We will see, it will become clear later,” he said.
Moreover, the head of state called on all officials not to seek a successor for him at present, but to attend to their work. “One must work, not seek successors,” he said.
“I now say frankly: if there are no corresponding changes in the constitution, then in a year or two, instead of normal work, a hunt will begin at various levels of power, with a search for possible successors,” the president explained.
“I am fully confident that we did the right thing in initiating changes to the constitution,” the president said, noting that the events of recent months have also proven this to be correct.
“Today, thank God, the domestic political situation is stable, but there are nuances related to our sovereignty,” the president noted. Putin recalled that, in particular, the republics of the USSR had the right to secede from the union, but the procedure for this was not regulated.
“The question arises: how to behave if this or that republic had entered the Soviet Union, but had received its ‘stock’ of vast Russian lands, traditional Russian historical territories, and then suddenly decided to leave the Union,” said the Russian leader. “At least it should have left then with the lands it had, and not taken with it the ‘gifts’ received from the Russian people. Was not all that written off?”
