Yeltsin uses summit as soapbox to push for referendum win

on the way back from his first summit with US President Bill Clinton and

started canvassing support for a referendum on April 25.

Itar-Tass news agency said Yeltsin, who won promises of $1.6 billion

in US aid at the Vancouver summit, urged people in the city of Bratsk to

vote for his reforms.

The referendum paper, altered last week by Russia's conservative

supreme legislature as part of a power struggle with the reformist

president, will contain four questions.

''I propose a simple formula for voting -- go out and vote 'yes' to

all four questions,'' he said after visiting the city's aluminium

smelter, the world's largest.

Yeltsin needs the support of half the electorate, according to rules

set by a hostile Congress of People's Deputies, the supreme legislature.

But he will have to fight hard to overcome growing political apathy

and disillusionment with the Government's radical but painful economic

reforms.

The daily evening newspaper Izvestia today published an opinion poll

showing that 43% of those asked said they would vote for the Russian

leader.

The poll of 1617 people in 13 regions across Russia also showed

Yeltsin support among the officer corps was growing fast.

''The most optimistic forecasts suggest Yeltsin could get the backing

of 46% of the population, which in any normal country would be

considered a great achievement,'' it said.

Congress had diluted the referendum questions last month, removing

earlier references to new elections in November 1993 and using the vague

formula ''early elections'' instead. This could be any time until 1995

for deputies or 1996 for Yeltsin.

It set four questions -- a vote of confidence in the president, a vote

of confidence in reforms begun since the Soviet collapse in late 1991,

and two on whether early presidential and parliamentary elections were

needed.

''Don't be afraid to say 'yes' even to the question relating to the

re-election of the president,'' Yeltsin added.

Tass said Yeltsin was convinced he would be re-elected because there

was no alternative: ''One might appear tomorrow or the day after

tomorrow, but this is the situation we have today,'' he said.

Yeltsin says the lawmakers' battle to slow his reforms masks a

come-back attempt by communist forces.

His earlier plan had been for a referendum on a new constitution,

which would abolish the Congress altogether. It had to be shelved when

deputies rewrote the questions.

One possible ace up Yeltsin's sleeve is the firm backing he received

from Clinton during the summit.

''He is the duly elected president of Russia and as long as he is, I

intend to work with him and support him because he embodies those

enduring (democratic) values,'' Clinton said.

Interfax news agency quoted Yeltsin as telling workers he had got to

know Clinton well at the summit. He said much of the aid would be spent

on developing small and medium businesses in Siberia.