Medvedev "early front-runner" for Kremlin top job

MOSCOW, Mar 15 (Reuters) A burst of lavish coverage on Russia's Kremlin-controlled television has thrust youthful Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev to the front of the pack in the race to succeed President Vladimir Putin.

With two years until Putin is to step down, the contest is still wide open. But analysts say the softly-spoken law graduate Medvedev -- featured on prime-time television this week patting cows on a farm -- has made the strongest start.

''There is no question that he's in pole position, that he is being built up as the Number 1 successor,'' said Christopher Granville, chief strategist with Deutsche UFG investment bank.

''But at the same time there are several risks for him.'' A Medvedev presidency would please financial markets. The 40-year-old is seen as the frontman for a Kremlin faction of business-minded technocrats that also includes Economy Minister German Gref and Gazprom chief executive Alexei Miller.

But unlike the President himself and many of those around him, the slightly-built Medvedev does not come from a KGB state security or military milieu and this rival faction could try to undermine him.

Medvedev's stewardship of so-called national projects involves allocating some of the multi-billion-dollar windfall from Russia's oil revenues to its most needy citizens.

This puts him in a privileged position to garner the sort of positive publicity any ambitious politician would dream of.

yesterday he was in Mordovia, an impoverished region east of Moscow. Decked out in a white coat, he toured a thriving dairy farm and then visited a village school to inspect the new computers provided by the government.

His visit was the second item on the state-run Channel One evening news -- only being displaced by news of Slobodan Milosevic's death. Coverage of Putin chairing meetings in the Kremlin was at third place in the running order.

A day earlier, Medvedev was on national television briskly issuing orders to uniformed officials from the Emergencies Ministry on how to prevent the spread of bird flu.

As in Soviet times, a politician's prominence on the news is seen as hugely significant by Kremlinologists trying to piece together what is happening in the corridors of power.

Like Putin, Medvedev was born in St Petersburg. He graduated from the law faculty at the university there, which was also Putin's alma mater.

PUBLICITY SHY Before Putin appointed him First Deputy Prime Minister last November, he was the president's publicity-shy chief of staff.

He is chairman of Gazprom's board.

However, Medvedev is almost certain to meet resistance from rivals inside the Kremlin.

They are the so-called ''siloviki'' -- people like Putin's deputy chief of staff Igor Sechin who have a KGB background and believe the state should be in firm control of the economy ''Medvedev is trying to push himself forward and the others are trying to stop him. There is quite a tough battle going on inside the Kremlin,'' said Dmitry Oreshkin, an analyst with the Mercator think tank.

Along with Medvedev, Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov, an old KGB comrade of Putin's, is also seen by some as an heir-apparent.

Ivanov however was politically damaged by a national furore over the brutal treatment handed out to a young army conscript by senior officers which led to him having his legs and genitals amputated.

But observers say Ivanov could overtake Medvedev yet if the latter does not show he has the steel to force through results against Russia's corrupt bureaucracy.

''Sergei Ivanov has the back-up role of someone who can be called upon if Medvedev 'blows up','' said Granville.

The constitution prevents Putin standing for a third term and he has said he has no plans to change the constitution.

Putin says it will be down to Russian voters, not the Kremlin, to choose his successor in a 2008 presidential election that he has said will be free and fair.

But analysts recall Putin himself was a little-known bureaucrat until Kremlin kingmakers, in the space of a few months, threw their resources behind him to transform him into the country's most popular politician.

REUTERS SHR RN2153