Samara made a choice

On October 23, the city election commission of Samara announced the preliminary results of the election of the head of the city. Based on the results of voting, 56.07% of voters voted for the representative of the “Russian Party of Life” by Viktor Tarkhov , 40.65% of the vote cast for the “United Russia” by George Limans . Thus, "United Russia" lost to the "RPG" in the second round of the elections.

They immediately commented on their failure in Samara in the United Russia CEC in Moscow , saying that the party would insist on conducting inspections on the facts of violations. Nevertheless, despite the obvious defeat, the "United Russia" are confident that in the upcoming elections of the deputies of the Samara Provincial Duma in March 2007, the Party of Power will win.

"It is fundamentally important for us to record violations of the electoral legislation in order to prevent such abuse in the Samara Provincial Duma in March 2007," the United Russia CEC said today.

" The election held in Samara is an intermediate stage of the political struggle . The emotional intensity will quickly subside, and people will figure out what the words of those who were abundant prompted promises," the party’s official website reports.

However, the ambitions of representatives of the "party of power" caused distrust among employees of both the local and central election commission. As Evgeny Kolyushin , a member of the Central Election Commission of Russia, noted, " those who are not satisfied with the election results can go to the court , this is their right. Perhaps, during the trials, further violations will be found, but I do not think that they will be the basis for overturning the results of the elections."

Evgeny Kolyushin is sure that "despite the dirt that the elections in our country overgrown, the situation in Samara shows that the elections are still an active tool for changes , a democratic way to transfer power. Legal grounds that would make it possible to cancel the election results."

However, representatives of United Russia made a statement stating that the number of unregistered voters in Samara has grown to almost 40 thousand people.

The chairman of the regional election commission, Olga Solomatin, commented on this: “I can’t believe that almost 40 thousand unregistered voters in the territory of Samara, this is a very large figure. Such a number of additional lists arose because many voters live in the city of Samara for temporary registration , although they did not have such an opportunity in the principle of active electoral law.

The only thing that can at least somehow affect the cancellation of the results is complaints about the bribery. But, as Evgeny Kolyushny noted, not a single fact has been proven yet. None of the statements indicate the person who allegedly performed these actions. In total, 19 complaints were received on this subject. Meanwhile, as the chairman of the horiz being noted, 108 complaints were received between the voting days, 66 of which were directly on the election day. Most of them concerned illegal agitation - 54. Of these, 22 were against Victor Tarkhov, 32 - regarding George Limansky. Five complaints are under consideration by Samara.

He also noted: "Now the numbers that were sounded, indicate that the Limansky lost. And according to existing electoral legislation, all the violations that came from the loser cannot influence the results of the elections. Even if they were."

Another fact that caused surprise among representatives of the election commission of all levels is the sudden termination of the work of the TIK of the Oktyabrsky district . “We are alarmed by the fact of a break in the work of the TIK of the Oktyabrsky district,” said Evgeny Kolyushny. “The commission without explaining the reasons, without an indication where people went, has taken a break in their work, this break continues to this day. Today we do not know when the TIK continues. Formally, the commission has three days to draw up the protocol, that is, it would still be possible to continue work. It is sealed, and we do not have complete information about what complaints there are. ”

In general, as the representative of the CEC noted, the voting day was completely organized. And the fact that over 400 thousand voters took part in the elections, speaks of mass and relevance of the issue.