No one doubted it yet, but now it’s as good as official. Russians could cast their votes from Friday to Sunday and, according to the Central Electoral Commission, Putin won almost 88 percent of the votes.
Russian state television declared 71-year-old Putin the winner on Sunday, based on several exit polls from institutions close to the Kremlin. and the president also claimed victory on Sunday evening.
The first real results are not expected until Monday. But usually the forecasts match the final election results. This would be a record for Putin, who received 76.7 percent of the votes in 2018.
Putin will now be able to prepare for a new six-year term in office. He was first elected president in 2000. So he has been calling the shots in Russia for 24 years: twenty years as president and in between four years as prime minister (2008-2012). His new term of office is therefore his fifth and will run until 2030. As a result of the constitutional amendment that was implemented in 2020, he may then run for president again. In theory, he can remain in the saddle until 2036, when he will be 83 years old. (Read more below the photo)
© AFP
Although the elections were overshadowed by the war in Ukraine, soured relations with the West and the death of opponent Alexei Navalny, the stakes of the electoral battle were not very high. After all, it already seemed like a foregone conclusion that Putin would win the presidential elections. The main opponents of his regime are in exile abroad, in jail, or have suddenly died. The sole purpose of the election seemed to be to provide Vladimir Putin with the necessary legitimacy.
The participation rate is also said to have reached a record. According to Ella Pamfilova, the chair of the Central Electoral Commission, the rate was 74.22 percent, the highest ever in a Russian presidential election. Opponents noted that this record was only achieved through repression and coercion. According to the Kremlin, Putin has been informed of the preliminary results.
“Stronger and more efficient Russia”
He began his victory speech, which was broadcast on state television, by thanking citizens. “We are one and the same team, all the citizens of Russia who went to the polling stations and voted,” he said to his team campaign. “The results of the elections show the confidence of the country’s citizens and their hope that we will do everything as planned.”
Putin assured that Russia will not be “intimidated” or “crushed” after two years of conflict in Ukraine and crisis with the West. “It doesn’t matter who wants to intimidate us or crush us,” Putin said. “No one in history has ever managed to do something like this. This didn’t work today and won’t work in the future.”
The name of the president was chanted from the audience. (Read more below the photo)
© AFP
Not legitimate
According to the Ukrainian president, Putin is “drunk with power” and is doing everything he can so that he can “rule forever.” “This election fraud has no legitimacy and cannot have any,” Zelenskiy said. “This figure must end up in the dock in The Hague, we must ensure that, everyone in the world who values life and decency.”
The Polish Foreign Ministry said on Sunday that the presidential elections in Russia were “not legal, free and fair”. The polls took place “in a context of severe repression”. Voting also took place in the occupied territories in Ukraine, which is a violation of international law, Warsaw said.
The US National Security Council spokesman said: “The elections are clearly not free and fair, given the way Mr Putin has jailed political opponents and prevented others from running against him.”
“Not reality”
The team of Russian opponent Alexei Navalny – who died in a Russian penal colony – denounces the result that Putin allegedly achieved in the elections. That result “doesn’t have the slightest bearing on reality,” says Leonid Volkov, Navalny’s former right-hand man.
“The percentages proposed for Putin, of course, do not have the slightest bearing on reality,” Volkov said. “They are not worth talking about.”
According to Volkov, the silent protest on Sunday afternoon – following the call for it from Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya – shows the absurdity and worthlessness of the percentages. He states that the focus of the election campaign was therefore not on voting itself, but on the people. “People need to see each other to become stronger, and that is what happened,” Volkov said on X.
Navalnaya had called on her late husband’s supporters to all line up at polling stations at the same time on Sunday afternoon in silent protest. She herself had written her husband’s name on the ballot paper she submitted at the Russian embassy in Berlin.