Vladimir Lenin's heirs split at their most vulnerable seam yesterday when the communist speaker of the parliament, Mr Gennady Seleznyov, broke with the party leadership to endorse publicly the hardline economic liberal Mr Sergei Kiriyenko as Russia's next prime minister.
Mr Seleznyov's move, which happened while the communist leader, Mr Gennady Zyuganov, was away from the Russian capital, is particularly embarrassing for the communists, coming the day after President Boris Yeltsin ordered his chief-of-staff to buy the support of parliamentary deputies with cars, flats and other items.
The communist speaker told Radio Russia after meeting Mr Yeltsin that he expected Mr Kiriyenko to cross the 226-vote threshold in the State Duma on Friday. He said he would be among those voting for the former banker.
Mr Seleznyov, who had tried to convince the president to offer parliament a more acceptable candidate, said the Russian leader was immovable in his determination to put Mr Kiriyenko at the head of the cabinet, and said he would dissolve the Duma if it rejected him three times. Friday's vote will be the second.
"I think the majority of deputies will make the right choice - the Duma must be preserved," said Mr Seleznyov.
"I sensed that I had done all I can. I couldn't change the president's mind."
The communists are the biggest party in the Duma with almost a third of all seats. If even part of their number supported Mr Kiriyenko, he would have a good chance of getting through.
The deputy head of the communist party, Mr Valentin Kuptsov, said yesterday that Mr Seleznyov would not convince other members and that the communists would stick by their decision to vote against the president's nominee.
Mr Yuri Ivanov, a communist and deputy head of the Duma's legislation committee, said he would never support Mr Yeltsin's candidate.
"You can talk all you like about tactical issues, about whether it's worth risking the Duma and plunging the country into elections for the sake of a boy in short trousers like Kiriyenko," he said. "But my position is that the president is a half-insane old man, not simply old but malicious."
But there were signs yesterday that the communists were facing a broader split. And in another blow for Mr Zyuganov, the constitutional court rejected a communist case that the president could not present the same candidate twice.
The two regional leaders most favoured by the parliamentary opposition as alternative candidates - Moscow mayor Mr Yuri Luzhkov and the speaker of the upper legislature, Mr Yegor Stroyev - have already come out in favour of Mr Kiriyenko.
In the heart of working-class Russia, in the devastated Siberian coal region of the Kuzbass, the communist-friendly governor, Mr Aman Tuleyev, also spoke up for Mr Kiriyenko, who visited the region during his short spell as energy minister. "He has an analytical mind and a computer-like brain," he said.
Analysts said Mr Seleznyov's change of heart yesterday greatly increased Mr Kiriyenko's chances of success on Friday. "The position of speaker in the Russian parliament has always been significant, he can strongly influence the outcome of the vote," said the Carnegie Endowment's Mr Nikolai Petrov.