Institutional backbone of the Gorbachev presidency, from General Department chief to head of the Presidential Apparatus
The day Gorbachev won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1990, he called Revenko in and joked, 'Want to see a Soviet millionaire?' The two then allocated the entire million-plus dollars to children's oncology centres and Chernobyl areas. When done, Gorbachev smiled: 'Well, no more millionaire.'
A Ukrainian Soviet apparatchik who served as head of the CPSU Central Committee General Department and chief of the USSR Presidential Apparatus, forming the institutional core of perestroika governance. Rising through Komsomol and party bodies in Odessa and Kiev, he was called to Moscow in 1984 and became head of the General Department in 1985, controlling the Central Committee's document flow and functioning as Gorbachev's closest staff officer. With the creation of the presidency in 1990, he served on the Presidential Council and then as head of the Presidential Apparatus, managing the shift from party to presidential administration. After the USSR's dissolution he was vice president of the Gorbachev Foundation before returning to Kiev.
Career Timeline
- 1958–1961Engineer, Odessa Refrigeration Machinery Plant
- 1961–1972Komsomol leadership in Odessa, Secretary of the Ukrainian Komsomol CC
- 1972–1980Inspector of the CPU CC, Secretary and Second Secretary of Kiev Oblast Committee
- 1980–1984Presidium member of the Ukrainian SSR Supreme Soviet, Chairman of the CPU Auditing Commission
- 1984–1985Inspector of the CPSU CC, Deputy Head of the Organizational-Party Work Department
- 1985–1991Head of the CPSU CC General Department — Gorbachev's de facto chief of staff
- 1990–1991Member of the USSR Presidential Council
- 1991–1992Head of the Presidential Apparatus of the USSR