Violations have been corrected

Golos and other independent observers talk about the unprecedented dirty technologies used in voting on the Constitution: open coercion, direct campaigning with the participation of officials, and the exclusion of observers. With details about the first days of the plebiscite - Konstantin Glikin

Already in the first three days of voting, more than 27 million Russians managed to cast their vote. Regional authorities report that the voting is generally without violations. Thus, the capital's representatives of the Public Headquarters for Monitoring the Voting on Amendments to the Constitution declare that "everything is going on as usual - both voting and monitoring it."

Human rights activists and independent experts, at the same time, record large-scale violations every day of voting. The “Voice” movement revealed 158 violations in just one day of voting. The key types of violations are campaigning “for amendments”, the dismissal of employees under threat of dismissal, and the exclusion of observers.

On the whole, the Golos movement described the first day of voting as follows: “The all-Russian voting campaign until June 25 took place in a situation of total restriction of the fundamental rights and freedoms of citizens, the absence of guarantees for the equality of opponents and supporters of the amendments during campaigning, the state abused its capabilities to conduct a campaign and mass forcing people to vote.

Voting by order

Already weeks before the start of voting, many companies and enterprises, especially those with state participation, began to notify their employees about the mandatory voting procedure for them. In the Golos movement , they point out that in addition to direct instructions to employees to go to polling stations, public reports on voting by the entire team are also a violation. For example, firefighters from Krasnogorsk voted with the whole part.

Politician Alexei Navalny and his associates also recorded a large number of violations. In his social networks, he quoted a letter to him from employees of the National Guard: “Hello. In touch with the Russian Guard, Moscow. Everyone who is registered with the unit, including family members, is driven to vote ATTENTION - from July 25 to 27. That is, in the days of online voting, we somehow agreed on the early voting of our servicemen.”

Voting, according to observers, takes place in a situation of total restriction of the fundamental rights and freedoms of citizens, the absence of guarantees for the equality of opponents and supporters of the amendments during campaigning, the state abuses its capabilities for campaigning and mass coercion

about the fact that state employees are being forced to vote Moscow City Duma deputy Mikhail Timonov also wrote : “Not only is the voting procedure planned for July 1 devoid of legal meaning, not only does it have a number of holes that allow falsification of any scale, but also preparation for it is carried out in a completely outlandish way: with mass voting coercion, which is considered a criminal offense in elections.

The “Voice” movement emphasizes that “according to Part 8 of Art. 2 of the Federal Constitutional Law on the amendment to the Constitution of the Russian Federation, no one can force citizens to participate or not to participate in voting.

No right to secrecy

A separate type of violation was the absence of a normal place for voting in many polling stations. Without special conditions it is impossible to ensure the secrecy of the vote.

Among the places that were forced to become platforms for the expression of will were meadows, parking lots, hemp, yurts, trunks, supermarket carts.

The “Voice” movement notes : “Voting in the adjacent territories leads to significant problems in ensuring the guarantees of the rights of voting participants and, at the same time, is not at all in demand among residents (at least in cities). Such voting procedures only undermine the credibility of its results.”

Online, politicians and activists began to ridicule the voting platforms. So, Alexei Navalny tweeted about voting in the trunk: “Dear everyone. Official statement. I stop criticizing the “all-Russian vote”, because I can’t say anything more convincing than this shooting. This is Vladivostok. "Polling station" is organized in the trunk of a car in the yard.

Campaigning at polling stations

According to the electoral law, officials and government agencies do not have the right to campaign for or against the amendments. Nevertheless, violations of this rule have been and are coming from all regions. Primorsky Territory Governor Oleg Kozhemyako announced his support for the amendments in the voting room itself.

At the same time, any agitation “against” the amendments was severely suppressed by law enforcement officers. So, on June 24, law enforcement officers broke in and detained activists who received leaflets against “zeroing” at the printing house.

The state media of the regions did not hide their approving position on the amendments. Thus, on the Omskregion website, the editors openly publish a statement in support of the amendments.

Officials and state structures have no right to agitate for or against the amendments. Nevertheless, violations of this rule have been and are coming from all regions. Governor of Primorsky Krai Oleg Kozhemyako announced his support for the amendments in the polling station itself

Another serious violation of the law, according to Golos, was the huge circulation of KP throughout the country, in which there was campaigning for the amendments. “The content of the newspaper is obviously propaganda in nature. It positively assesses many of the amendments introduced, contains direct calls to vote for them, and quotes statements by famous people in support of the amendments. There are no critical comments against the proposed amendments. According to the release data, the newspaper was released in March 2020 with a circulation of 10 million copies. It is placed among the information materials of the commission, and somewhere it is posted right on the information stand, ” says Golos.

Drops online and offline

Two regions in the Russian Federation - Moscow and the Nizhny Novgorod region provide the right to vote online. The creators of the remote voting system proved to the public and experts that the system is very strong and will not allow repeated voting and failures. Nevertheless, even on the first day of voting, Muscovites did not have the technical ability to vote until the middle of the day due to a system failure. The key and more serious problem was the so-called "repeated" voting. Both journalists and activists have proven that it is theoretically possible to vote twice - both offline and online. However, even in the offline voting format, some managed to vote more than once. So, a resident of St. Petersburg was able to cast her vote both at the site and in the yard. The main response of the authorities to these facts consists in retaliatory accusations. Activists and journalists who show the defects of the system are accused of provocations and creating fakes.

Some PEC members did not even require a passport to vote. And in some points gave out they even two ballots in one hand. Even more freely interpret the laws of the country in foreign countries. So, in Israel, a woman was not only able to vote electronically, but later came to the polling station with her minor daughter. In the end, both of them were able to cast their vote.

Not without elections and stuffing. Thus, in the Tambov region, observers noted areas where entire bundles of ballots ended up in the ballot box. In some areas, the injections were so obvious and serious that they were even recognized by the authorities. For example, in St. Petersburg, two members of the PEC were eventually suspended from work, due to the discovery of stuffing on their territory.

Few observers - many voters

Formally, CEC head Pamfilova reported that would 500,000 observers follow the vote. However, many observers, who sought to control the voting process, were unable to obtain official status from the CEC. The only body capable of directing observers was the public chambers. NGOs, including Golos, were deprived of the right to direct activists directly. According to the movement, in many regions many people were unable to overcome bureaucratic obstacles: “In the Ivanovo region, by June 25, the public chamber did not issue at least several civil activists with directions to the polling stations and did not even say when these directions would be and at what plot distributed observers. A resident of Moscow reported a similar situation

Even those who received monitoring mandates were not completely protected from the pressure of the authorities. So, in Khimki near Moscow, observers were forcibly expelled from the polling station. Interfered with the work and the observer in Makhachkala.

According to Maxim Gongalsky, deputy of the Ramenka Council, falsifications “have not become a thing of the past even in Moscow.” He writes: “Independent members of the election commissions in Ramenki suspect the preparation of large-scale stuffing (7% of the number of voters!). At some polling stations, the turnout (in terms of the number of ballots issued) is 4%, and at some - 40%! Strange difference in the behavior of voters, isn't it? True, so far these are not stuffings, but preparations for them: TEC Ramenki sends such numbers “upstairs”, and at the polling stations themselves the numbers are much lower (at one of the PECs 38 versus 696 according to the TEC). Perhaps they are waiting for approval from above, and then they will do the rest: drawing statements from “thirsty voters to vote early” and actually stuffing ballots.”

In total, according to the Golos movement, as of June 29, were recorded in Russia. more than 600 violations

Read the opinion of experts why the authorities went to such large-scale violations, read here .

Photo: Dmitry Markov/facebook.com/dcim.ru