The Kremlin announced a tender on Monday for a computerised system which will appraise Russia's regional governors, giving ammunition to critics who say President Vladimir Putin is meddling in political life. A notice posted on the Kremlin web site www.kremlin.ru offered 720,000 roubles ($25,290) for a system to monitor social, economic and political indicators in the regions and use them as a basis for judgement on a governor's performance.
The system must be ready by December 5, the notice said. Under a law that came into force this year, gubernatorial elections were scrapped, with Putin instead nominating governors for approval by local legislatures.
Critics of the law say the Kremlin is trying to grab all political power but will be unable to keep control over governors and their huge bureaucratic machines in 89 regions stretching along 11 time zones.
Putin asked parliament to grant him the right to nominate governors as a means to tighten discipline in the country which he says is waging a war against terrorism.
He made the request soon after last September's Beslan hostage siege, when gunmen from Russia's separatist Chechnya region raided a school in southern Russia. More than 300 people, half of them children, were killed.