PRESS: Medvedev, Sobyanin, Dyumin most possible Putin successors

MOSCOW, Aug 21 (PRIME) -- Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin and Tula Region Governor Alexei Dyumin were rated the top-3 contenders to become successors to President Vladimir Putin, business daily Kommersant reported on Monday, citing fund Petersburg Politics.

The authors of the rating took into account such factors as professional advancements or failures, public expectations of their activities and public openness, even-temperedness, proactivity, existence of smear campaigns against them and the frequency of meetings with Putin.

Kommersant reported that the top-20 participants will form the elite in 2018–2024 and that the term ‘successor’ is used in a broad sense and does not include the president post only.

Medvedev topped the rating as, according to the rating authors, he has managed to overturn the negative dynamics of his personal popularity rating.

Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, Speaker of the Federation Council, the parliament’s upper house, Valentina Matviyenko, former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, head of the presidential administration Anton Vaino and his deputy Sergei Kiriyenko, Speaker of the State Duma, the parliament’s lower house, Vyacheslav Volodin and CEO of Rosneft Igor Sechin occupied the rest of the top 10.

Head of the republic of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov was ranked 13th and opposition politician Alexei Navalny was ranked 18th.

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