MEP: Putin Orchestrates Russian Presidential Elections
Russia's Central Election Committee's decision to validate the candidacies of five presidential hopefuls is part of Prime Minister Putin's plan to not only secure the victory and eliminate the necessity for the second round of elections, but to stifle any opposition, said Member of European Parliament Kristiina Ojuland with regard to the pre-election atmosphere in Russia.
"A convincing victory in the first round would give Putin a considerably greater amount of self-confidence for his new term of office, which would probably also carry over to the next election," Ojuland said.
"Prokhorov, Zyuganov, Mironov, and Zhirinovsky - none of them are serious opponents for Putin," explained Ojuland. According to the Russian weekly news magazine The New Times, Putin made a personal phone call to Prokhorov to ask him to announce his candidacy. "The fact that Putin will not have a strong opponent in the coming elections has been known for a long time, but an attempt was made to leave the impression that it would be possible for anybody to register their candidacy," continued Ojuland. "What they failed to mention was the fact that this was merely a formal possibility, with the Kremlin calling all the shots."
Barring Yabloko Party leader Grigory Yavlinsky and Irkutsk Governor Dmitry Mezentsev from competing in the March 4 presidential election winnows down the number of candidates whose electorate Putin would have had to take into consideration to some degree. Since Putin's approval rating is currently below 50 percent, it was necessary to eliminate them, so that at least 51 percent of the ballots could be counted for Putin on the election day.
Mikhail Kasyanov, who is one of the leaders of the liberal political movement Parnas, decided to withhold his candidacy, because as the 2008 presidential elections already demonstrated, Russia is far from having honest elections. "Clearly, there is no point in working at getting elected just to give the Kremlin an opportunity to cross your name off the list for no reason whatsoever," said Ojuland.
According to her, all this suggests that the recent demonstrations in Moscow and elsewhere in Russia have not had a significant impact on the Kremlin's leadership style.
"If anything, Putin has been acting even more resolutely, following the tenets of interest-driven realpolitik to the letter and crushing the hopes of those Russian citizens who have been protesting on the streets and standing up for the adoption of honest and value-driven politics," noted Ojuland.
"At the same time, a look at the Russian middle class which is becoming increasingly politically active shows that the future is not too gloomy and I believe that we will soon see a significant upheaval on the Russian political landscape," concluded Ojuland.
Sigrid Maasen