"Only God and the Presidential Administration"

Editorial “Layout” March 20, 2024 |

Putin's record election result froze the political system in Russia

The record results of the presidential elections - more than 87% for Vladimir Putin with a turnout of 77% - did not bring satisfaction even to those who ensured these results. The regional officials interviewed by VERSTKA only “breathed a sigh of relief” and do not hope for any reward other than “preserving the status quo,” which can be shaken “only by God and the presidential administration.”

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Battle for turnout

During all three days of voting, the word that regional officials most often mentioned in conversations with Vorstka was the word “turnout.” Or, in some cases, its diminutive form is “yavochka.” This was the only electoral indicator that worried officials, because it was they who had to report to the Kremlin’s internal political bloc and embassies. Therefore, they were almost mortally afraid of low turnout rates.

Perhaps the most revealing picture was in one of the regions of the Central Federal District. There, according to Vorstka’s interlocutors in the local government, at the regional level “the problem of turnout was solved” by Saturday evening: it became clear that it would exceed 75%. “But the city [meaning the regional center - “Vorstka”] did not give the required figure, and the mayor understood this. Sunday morning we just sat back with some popcorn and watched it pop out. But soon the popcorn had to be put aside,” says Vorstka’s source.

The reason for this was the start of a massive call from the city administration to the heads of municipal institutions, who, concurrently, were also the heads of the PEC. Officials demanded that the turnout be sharply increased at any cost, including calling friends, relatives and distant acquaintances. “And people understood that if this was not done, then the rude person on the other end of the line could very soon disappear [that is, the official could be fired]. And they stopped moving completely,” he explained. As a result, “the turnout was completed at night in the TECs,” which was facilitated by a small number of independent observers and commission members.

At the same time, despite the target turnout figures “communicated to the administrations” from the Kremlin, officials spent all three days looking at neighboring regions to compare how they were doing. “We squeezed out everything we could, but it turned out that this was not enough, because the neighbors got 15% more. We went to the second round - have we mobilized everyone, and you know, reserves were found again!” — another regional official says with a smile.

As a result, according to VASTKA’s calculations, 32 regions have shown a more than double-digit increase in turnout since 2018. Two types of subjects gave less: where there was nowhere to grow anyway, for example, the Caucasian republics, which traditionally give high percentages of voter turnout compared to the rest of the country. And where there were previously questions about the “quality of governance” - for example, the Altai Territory (a drop in turnout by 5.5 percentage points compared to 2018) and the Komi Republic (minus 1.5 percentage points).

Already on Monday, the day after the end of the elections, experts from the Golos movement of independent observers announced possible massive voter fraud. According to their calculations, stuffing could exceed 22 million votes - that is, a quarter of all voters who, according to the Central Election Commission, came to the polling stations (a total of 87.6 million people voted). At the same time, Golos directly calls its assumption the “lower bar,” since it only takes into account direct falsifications without taking into account other methods of influencing turnout and results.

The co-chairman of the movement, Stanislav Andreychuk, even commented on the election results at individual polling stations. “Falsification is at such a level this year that the numbers don’t mean anything at all,” he noted and cited Moscow PEC No. 2601 as an example, where the current president received 99.23%. Such a result cannot happen in Moscow, which always votes more protestly than other regions, by definition, experts say.

However, officials were little concerned about these accusations. “The voting is over - and thank God. But I feel sorry for Volodya,” one of them told Vorstka. He was not talking about Putin, but about the governor of the Tomsk region and a former employee of the Kremlin’s internal political bloc, Vladimir Mazur - in the region he governs, the increase in turnout was only 0.8%, and in some polling stations, the quasi-protest candidate from the New People, Vladislav Davankov, received more than 30% of the votes - compared to 3.85% on average in the country.

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Abroad against Putin

For the first time in the history of elections in foreign polling stations, the winner received less than at home. Vladimir Putin, according to the Central Election Commission, received 72.3% of the votes in foreign territories, Davankov came second with a result of 16.65%. For comparison, in 2018, Putin outside the Russian Federation scored 85% with an overall result of 76.69%.

In many countries, queues at polling stations turned into protest rallies. Thus, in Prague, voters stood in line for four hours, and in Tel Aviv - for seven. Voters brought with them protest posters and flags of Ukraine. In Georgia, the frontman of the Pornofilmy group, Vladimir Kotlyarov, spoke at the “Noon Against Putin” rally. However, in the end, the total number of protest votes turned out to be relatively small: Davankov, according to Vorstka’s calculations, won only 14.9% of foreign polling stations.

Traditionally, the largest number of pro-government votes came not from them, but from tens of thousands of Russians in the territories of Abkhazia and Belarus, where Putin had previously won by a huge margin. For example, at polling station No. 8019 (one of several polling stations in Abkhazia), he received 95.22%, and at the location of Russian military units in Armenia - a record 99.2%.

Opposition actions

The opposition voting plans did not produce results that seriously affected the CEC data. Opposition-minded citizens were called upon to come to the polling stations exactly at 12:00 to show the number of those who disagree with the authorities. However, in Moscow from 12:00 to 15:00, according to the Central Election Commission, 4.3% of voters voted (for comparison, from morning to noon in the capital 4.55% of voters made their choice). In St. Petersburg, three hours after noon the turnout was 6.25%, and before 12:00 - 4.37% of voters, a similar picture in other large cities.

According to political scientist Ekaterina Shulman, the opposition’s action was “a game not for results,” but “for impressions.” “One photo [from the queues near polling stations] weighs more than all the columns with numbers that they will show,” she is sure.

“Verstka” has already written about different strategies of the opposition in the elections. “There were about 1.4% of invalid ballots; this figure did not increase significantly compared to 2018. For example, Mikhail Khodorkovsky and representatives of the Anti-Corruption Foundation proposed “damaging” ballots during elections. The initiative of blogger Maxim Katz, who proposed voting for Davankov, had a slightly better result. He actually won at several foreign polling stations and even scored double-digit percentages at dozens of polling stations in large Russian cities. But all this did not help him even become second - in the final protocol he lost to the communist Nikolai Kharitonov.

Katz himself called the election results a “full-fledged dictatorial result,” which is “dangerous for both the regime and the citizens,” because the government may decide that it has the right to “do whatever it wants,” and the people in response may well let it understand that playing with themselves in the elections is one thing, but raising taxes or launching a new mobilization is another.

Preservation of the system

Speaking to reporters on the night of the vote count, Vladimir Putin said that he did not intend to rush into personnel changes (by law he must dismiss the government and appoint a new one) and was satisfied with the work of his subordinates.

“The results of the work over the past couple of years have shown that, in general, the administrative team, in the broad sense of the word, is very effective and the results of the work are satisfactory,” he considered. “This applies to the government, the central bank, and the presidential administration.” And at a meeting with his former “competitors” on the same day, Putin spoke a lot about the need for “calibrated decisions” and “maintaining stability.”

First of all, the elections were needed as a demonstration of strength - for the elites, abroad and their own citizens, a Kremlin official explained to VERSTKA, commenting on the voting results. “S - stability,” he described them and added that now, having received the support of the electorate, the president receives carte blanche for any decisions, including not very popular ones. “Whether this is a real carte blanche or an imaginary permit, we will only find out later,” the source concluded.

The same attitude reigned in the regional administrations. Now they can put on medals “For the victory over Davankov” and calmly settle into their positions. The governor will show anyone who comes with questions the turnout and results for Putin. You no longer have to look for your truth either from the security forces or from the public. Only God and AP i remained,” a political strategist who worked for United Russia for a long time told Vorstka.

Cover: Maria Petrova

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