President-elect Vladimir Putin, who in May will return to the presidency after serving four years as prime minister, said he is not against eliminating the clause in the Constitution that allowed him to run for a third, non-consecutive term as president.
“As for replacing the limiting phrase 'two consecutive terms' with 'two terms' in the Constitution: I think this is reasonable, it is something that could be thought over together with all the factions,” Putin said in his final report as prime minister to the State Duma, the lower house of Russia’s parliament.
Article 81, Paragraph 3, of the Russian Constitution states: “The same person may not hold the office of president of the Russian Federation for more than two consecutive terms.”
Putin was president for two consecutive, four-year terms, from 2000 to 2008.
The Constitution was amended in 2008 to increase the presidential term to six years from four previously. Thus, under the "two-consecutive-terms" rule, Putin could be re-elected to a fourth, six-year term in 2018, keeping him in the presidency until 2024.
