MOSCOW It was very quiet at the polling place in the premises of the Plehanov University of Economics on Sunday morning. There were more officials and security guards in the lobby of the congress center than there were voters.
Then, at noon, a queue suddenly formed in the polling hall.
Many of those who came at 12 o’clock did not believe that voting would change anything. Aleksandr Ten still thought it was important to vote – just as it had been important to visit the opposition leader To Alexei Navalny at the funeral.
He had already been to another polling station, but there had been so many people there that he was directed to a new polling station.
– It makes me happy. It’s nice to see I’m not the only one who thinks this way, he said.
Called by the opposition forces “half day Putin against” was a show of strength. Opponents of the current regime got to see that they are not alone, that there are others who think the same way.
On the other hand, the narrow limits are visible herein which the opposition outside the system has to act in the current conditions.
Elections were still a fairly safe way to show off: Arresting citizens en masse who come to vote in complete peace would already seem too absurd even in Russia’s current conditions. A big show would have been too much of a distraction.
The non-governmental organization OVD-info is reported of at least 86 arrests in 20 cities on Sunday.
If the expression of opinion includes the risk of going to prison, losing one’s job or study place, it is already much more difficult for opposition figures abroad to urge someone to do so.
It would seem that they are leading people to dangerous paths, but they themselves are sitting in safety.
That is precisely why Navalny’s loss was such a big blow to the opposition. At least Navalny could not be said not to have taken a personal risk.
Sunday’s silent protest did not seriously threaten Operation of the Russian election machinery. Those in power had left nothing to chance in the elections.
Voting for the presidential election was extended to three days for the first time, and in several regions it was possible to vote electronically with a remote connection.
It is practically impossible for election observers to check the results of electronic voting.
These reforms gave the authorities good opportunities to twist the election results in the direction they wanted.
Figures of the Central Election Commission by Putin’s vote share was 87.3 percent, after 99 percent of the votes had been counted.
This is even more than the Kremlin has been told it is aiming for.
The election authorities allowed the nomination just colorless figures from opposition parties loyal to the Kremlin.
The struggle for second place in the elections is hardly of particular interest to the citizens. It didn’t seem to interest the politicians either. There haven’t been many election ads on the streets, and even the election videos speak of lack of enthusiasm.
Candidate of the Russian Communist Party Nikolai Kharitonov looked like a grumpy pensioner who wanders into Red Square to reminisce about the good old days of the Soviet Union.
The nationalist LDPR party Leonid Slutsky once again, in his election ad, sat behind the solid table of the party leader – but ordered to leave his predecessor, the late Vladimir Zhirinovsky name plate. Slutski just lacks the charisma of the brash Zhirinovsky showman.
The New People party Vladislav Davankov presented himself in the style of a relatively liberal young technocrat. He has said that he hopes for peace negotiations, but on Russia’s terms.
The landslide victory predicted by door-to-door polls for Putin leaves the candidates of loyal support parties with embarrassingly little to share.
The Central Election Commission reported Haritonov 4.3 percent, Davankov 3.8 percent and Slutsky 3.2 percent of the votes.
These are numbers that the Kremlin’s curators of domestic politics can be happy with. On the other hand, from the point of view of maintaining the scenes of “guided democracy”, such numbers are already too crushing.
The administration seems to have less and less enthusiasm to even create the image of competition.
In these conditions, the biggest problem for those in power was sure to get the crowd going.
That’s why Friday, the working day, was so important. It was easy for the management of state institutions, state-owned companies and companies dependent on the state in various ways to ensure that employees went to vote.
Journalist Farida Rustamova has written about how employees in many state-owned companies and private companies were pressured to vote already on Friday.
The Central Election Commission announced that the turnout was 74 percent. That is also the number that the presidential administration has been told is its goal.
In the coming days, more information will probably come out about what means the local authorities had to resort to in order to implement the Kremlin’s order.
There was absolutely no need to manipulate the result. Putin has wide support in Russia. In situations of conflict, the citizens of any country meet to group around their leader.
Putin’s war policy has also benefited some Russians economically. For example, the wages of those working in the military industry have increased. The economy is running hot due to war spending, and unemployment is almost non-existent.
On the other hand, Putin’s support is based on largely to the lack of alternatives. The political field has been harshly cleaned of real alternatives.
Citizens have been taught right from the start that you can’t even think of anyone else as president.
So elections are more and more just a ritual. From the point of view of those in power, it is dangerous that ritual support can also evaporate surprisingly quickly. It was seen when the Soviet Union, which was considered eternal, fell apart.
In any case, Putin will claim a crushing victory as confirmation of his line.
He probably now considers himself to be firmly on top of both domestic politics and the war he is waging against Ukraine.
Major line changes are therefore unlikely to be expected. Putin may make personnel changes in his administration, but he is not necessarily in a hurry with them.
The brutal war continues. It has become a cornerstone of Putin’s regime’s ideology.