Not far from Sochi

The same thoughts and questions arise when you hear about yet another scandal in the regional elections in Russia. Firstly, it is becoming increasingly clear that the situation with the institution of elections in the country is catastrophic: fair and transparent elections clearly pose a danger and threat to the current government, no matter how much we are convinced to the contrary. Secondly, every time you are amazed at the extent to which the government must fear and hate its own citizens (and those who help the government, their own fellow citizens) in order to create such obstacles to observers and attack them.

Another scandal, and on a fairly large scale, broke out during the elections for the mayor of Anapa. It is enough to start with the fact that the observers were unable to reach the sites by transport - early in the morning the Sukko-Anapa road was blocked under the pretext of an alleged traffic accident. As a result of the road closure, not only about a hundred observers were injured, who had to walk, but also many motorists. Representatives of the Yabloko party, whose candidate participated in the elections and whose observers, in fact, were not able to get to the polling stations on time, note discrepancies in the testimony about the accident: according to the driver of the truck that allegedly crashed into the mountain, the accident occurred at six o’clock in the morning, and The police said that at seven. Eyewitnesses reported that the driver of the truck himself dumped metal structures from the body onto the highway, after which he declared that it was impossible to go further. In addition, buses with observers traveling to Anapa had their license plates taken, and as a result they were detained along the way.

As a result, when observers reached the polling stations, they were no longer able to see the ballot boxes and lists in the form in which they should be before the start of voting. Yabloko leader Sergei Mitrokhin, who also attended the elections and was doused with some kind of green liquid, is sure that all this was done in order to stuff ballots for the United Russia candidate Sergei Sergeev, who as a result, according to official data, and won.

Injections were recorded in a number of areas. Yabloko stated that their number does not allow the true expression of the will of voters to be established. Mitrokhin, who was removed from the polling station after closing because he was allegedly not registered as an observer, demanded that Churov cancel the election results in Anapa.

In addition to the actual stuffing, there was also blatant obstruction of the observers’ work. So, in many areas they were planted in a corner where nothing could be seen. In addition, in violation of the rules, they were given copies of the protocols without the signatures of all members of the commission. Yabloko observer Alexandra Gorkusha had her finger injured when she refused to sign the document in this form and the chairman began to tear the paper out of her hands. Another observer, Yaroslav Nikolsky, who tried to intervene, had his arms twisted, and the third, Vladimir Ponomarev, had his camera taken away. A chair was thrown at one of the observers. When the observers tried to call the police, they were told that they would be taken to check the level of narcotic substances in their blood. Representatives of the Golos Association also reported violations: in particular, the ballot boxes were opaque, and they were printed not in front of the first voter, but half an hour before the opening (when observers, caught by surprise by the so-called accident, had not yet reached the polling stations).

At the same time, the parties “For Justice!”, “For Women of Russia” and “Communists of Russia”, which nominated candidates for the elections, made a joint statement addressed to the chairman of the local election commission, in which they noted that “this was the most democratic election in recent times.” 15 years” (it’s not very clear why to make a special statement for such glorifications) and only the “Yabloko” supporters muddy the waters: they say, “during the elections, another trend appeared - the aggressive activity of observers, members of precinct election commissions from the candidate (Alexey) Egorov (Yabloko party), whose representatives in every possible way interfered with the normal work of the chairmen of precinct election commissions, bombarded them with far-fetched and unfounded complaints.” They allegedly exerted psychological pressure on PEC members, created a nervous environment, thereby interfering with the “normal flow of the electoral process.” Mitrokhin is accused in the document of unlawful actions. Apparently, they doused him with green liquid in order to prevent these actions, and in general, within the framework of the law, this is how issues with particularly zealous observers are supposed to be resolved.

Let's say, in fact, everything was clean and honest, there were no stuffing, the highway was blocked by pure coincidence. It can be assumed that Sergei Sergeev, being acting. mayor, he would have won anyway. But snatching paper out of hands, causing pain, fighting - all this was recorded on camera. Green liquid also occurred. As does the police proposal to test observers for drugs. If all this is just a reaction to the “provocation” of Yabloko, whose candidate, apparently, is far from popular, then we have to admit that there are very nervous people in the PECs and the police (on whose conscience the green liquid is, one can only guess - however , in “Communists of Russia” they believe that this was a PR campaign of “Yabloko”, that is, Mitrokhin, as the favorite character of the Russian government glorified by Gogol (and not Saltykov-Shchedrin, just in case), flogged himself, that is, doused himself - Well, either he instructed his party comrades or hired someone). In any case, such behavior does not paint the government and its supporters in any way. I would also like to note that observers from other parties that swore allegiance to the election commission for some reason did not get into such scandalous stories - their buses did not get stuck anywhere and no one poured green liquid on them. Well, if there were violations, then the behavior of the PEC and police officers demonstrates, among other things, their complete unpreparedness for outside observation.