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Today elections are being held in various regions of Russia. The stakes are high, especially for President Putin and his party. According to observers, there have already been numerous irregularities.
Eclipsed by the poison attack on Kremlin critic Alexej Navalny and the Corona crisis, the crucial day of regional elections has begun in Russia. On the main day of the elections, citizens of 41 regions of the country cast their votes, and there were also four by-elections on the allocation of seats in the Russian parliament. In total there are more than 9,000 different choices at different levels. The first polling stations have already closed in eastern Russia. The country has eleven time zones.
According to observers, there were irregularities in many polling stations. More than 1,000 reports of possible violations have already been received, said Grigory Melkonjanz, co-chair of the independent electoral observation group Golos, of the Echo Moskwy radio station in Moscow. “This includes cases of deliberate electoral fraud.”
Election observers have reported obstacles to their work, Melkonjants said. Violence was also used. “There have been reports of forced voting and bribery in many regions.” Some polling stations were already open on Friday. According to their own statements, the authorities wanted to reduce the risk of infection by the corona virus. Critics feared manipulation because it would be difficult to control the elections for three days.
Humor test for Putin
The regional elections a year before the Russian parliamentary elections are seen as a test of humor for President Vladimir Putin, whose reputation has suffered due to an unpopular pension reform and poor economic situation due to the oil crisis and the corona pandemic. In eastern Russia, the arrest of former Governor Sergei Furgal for his possible involvement in murder cases 15 years ago sparked the biggest protests the region has seen so far.
A second round cannot be ruled out in some regions, because people vote for the opposition in protest or the Kremlin candidate is considered weak. In the election of the governor of the Irkutsk region on Lake Baikal, even the Kremlin does not consider ruling out a second vote. “There is nothing wrong with that,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov.
The director of the research institute R.Politics, Tatiana Stanowaja, told the AFP news agency that the regional elections served the Kremlin as the basis for decision-making on whether to reform the ruling United Russia party and postpone the national parliamentary elections. .
Does “smart voting” work?
Poisoning Navalny with a military nerve agent from the Novichok group could have “contradictory consequences” for regional elections, according to Stanovaya. On the one hand, Nawalny’s campaign was hampered by the act, the political expert said. On the other hand, the poison attack caused “a shock” that may have led some citizens to the opposition camp.
Before collapsing on a domestic flight to Moscow, Navalny had been in Siberia to prepare for the elections. His team wants to break the dominance of the Kremlin party with the strategy of a “smart vote”. Voters should vote for someone, but under no circumstances for United Russia.
This method has been successful recently. But the government’s critics team firmly assumes that Putin’s party will defend its dominance “with forgeries”: “Criminals are aware of the danger that the protest vote represents for them,” he said. Navalny staff said they made recommendations for more than 1,100 candidates. Recently, opposition opponents were the victims of attacks on several occasions.
