Russia 2018: Kremlin Countdown

Standing Alone

Chemist Igor Prosanov greeted President Vladimir Putin during a campaign stop in Novosibirsk on February 8 with a one-man protest wearing a vest emblazoned with the slogan: "Putin Is Russia's Misfortune."

"Within 15 minutes, a police colonel came up and spoke with him," a local newspaper wrote. "After the officer left, two men in plain clothes came up to the picketer and hustled him into a civilian car."

On February 9, the newspaper got a letter from the regional election commission saying that Prosanov's vest had been declared illegal campaign material because it "formed a negative impression of presidential candidate V.V. Putin." Publishing the photograph, the letter warned, could be prosecuted as illegal campaigning. So the publication blurred out the last few letters of Putin's name in the photo for their article.

'Within The Framework Of The Law'

If you repeat something enough, people will believe it. The cheeky website Meduza has this mashup of Putin saying that everything must be done "within the framework of the law" about a million times over the course of his long rule. Enjoy.

Sobchak Says She's Sorry

While Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly denied accusations that Moscow meddled in the 2016 U.S. Presidential election, liberal presidential candidate Ksenia Sobchak says she thinks Russia might have done it -- and if so, she's "sorry."

Sobchak made the comments in an interview with CNN that aired on February 8.

"It sounds we really had something to do with it. If that's so, I want to say sorry," she told Christiane Amanpour, adding that meddling in the affairs of another nation is "unacceptable."

Sobchak has been making the rounds in Washington this week to discuss her candidacy, which she calls a protest option for voters who oppose the current political system.

Approached by a journalist from the U.S. entertainment tabloid site TMZ while in Washington, the former socialite rejected frequent references to her in the media as Russia's Paris Hilton.

"I am a political journalist in Russia for more than 10 years. I don't know who invented this about Paris Hilton, but really, it has nothing to do with me," she said.

Golos Election Monitor Detained In Krasnodar

Novaya Gazeta reported that David Kankiya, a local coordinator for the Golos election-monitoring NGO, was detained on February 9 without explanation in Krasnodar.

The local head of the Yabloko party said he believes Kankiya was detained to prevent Golos from organizing independent election monitoring.

RFE/RL's Russian Service report is here.

Political analyst Aleksandr Kynev wrote on Facebook that the activist was detained so that he couldn't "prevent the authorities from inflating the turnout -- something that is systematically and regularly done in Krasnodar."

Opposition politician Aleksei Navalny agreed, writing on his blog that Krasnodar Krai is the third-largest subject of the federation in terms of eligible voters and "the first in terms of turnout falsification."

"That is why we plan to make special efforts to organize monitoring of the turnout in Krasnodar Krai, Bashkortostan, Tatarstan, Kemerovo Oblast, and Saratov Oblast," Navalny wrote. "In each of these regions we have very strong teams and almost every day we are holding training sessions for election monitors."

Sobchak Against The Boycott

On February 8, candidate Ksenia Sobchak posted on her Ekho Moskvy blog her case against opposition leader Aleksei Navalny's call for an election boycott.

She argues that a boycott only helps the authorities, saying that if democratically minded people stay home, the percentage of votes for President Vladimir Putin will only increase. "The authorities will act in the future based on this [outcome], tightening the screws further and all the time saying they have 'national support,'" Sobchak wrote.

On the contrary, she says that if liberals can boost the turnout, there is a chance Putin will get less than 50 percent and force a second round of voting.

Navalny, who was disqualified from running because of an embezzlement conviction that he says was politically motivated, has argued that the election is a sham, calling it "the reappointment of Putin."

'Putin In A Skirt'

Candidate and socialite Ksenia Sobchak continued her strange visit to the United States, just weeks ahead of the vote in Russia, by attending a national prayer breakfast in Washington.

In this BBC report, she makes the memorable statement: "I really don't want to be seen as Putin in a skirt. I want to be seen as Ksenia Sobchak, which is who I am.

Russians Not Satisfied With Status Quo, Fear Change

Veteran Russian journalist Andrei Kolesnikov has cowritten a report for the Carnegie Endowment For International Peace, exploring a August 2017 survey, conducted with the Levada Center, of roughly 1,600 Russians. The survey found that many Russians don’t want profound changes and but also that increasing numbers also don’t support the status quo, albeit for differing and sometimes conflicting reasons. In this panel discussion on February 8, Kolesnikov discussed the findings in more depth.

RFE/RL Russian Service correspondent Yelena Rykovtseva sat down with political scientists Aleksandr Kynev, Vladimir Semago, and Mikhail Tulsky to discuss the final list of eight presidential candidates and the course of the election campaign so far.

At one point, RFE/RL asks whether Putin will hold on to the presidency until he dies. Kynev says he thinks Putin will leave office in 2024, as the constitution requires, but will remain as a powerbroker. "Various options will be discussed, but I think it will involve the preservation of the current governing model," he said. "The post of president, I think, will remain. They are unlikely to cancel that. But what is possible is the redistribution of roles among political institutions. That, I think, is realistic."

Путин и семеро хотят

Елена Рыковцева: Сегодня праздник у ребят. Мы хотим поздравить всех россиян с тем, что они наконец-то получили избирательный бюллетень, в котором наконец-то зафиксированы все 8 фамилий кандидатов в президенты Российской Федерации. Мы теперь понимаем, о чем говорим, не гадаем на кофейной гуще, не думаем, у кого сколько шансов, кому забракуют подписи, а кому, наоборот, пропустят все, что он насобирал. Мы обсуждаем эти 8 фамилий со знанием дела. С нами Владимир Семаго. С нами на связи Александр Кынев. Вы сегодня, наверное, тоже поражены тому, что сегодня увидели, – это такой сюрприз для вас как для политолога, этот список?

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'Proactive And Preventative' Election Monitoring

Golos, a Russian NGO, has long been respected as one of the country’s premier election monitoring organizations. The group was hit with “foreign agent” label in 2014, on account of some of the foreign funding it has received, a label that has hampered some of its operations. Still, last month, Golos accused state-controlled TV networks of delivering free campaign advertising for President Vladimir Putin ahead of the March presidential vote.

In an op-ed published this week in the Moscow Times, the group’s co-chairman Grigory Melkonyants called for extra vigilance to ensure that government does not try to artificially boost turnout.

More On Prikhodko

One might think that the revelations about Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Prikhodko that were released by anticorruption activist Aleksei Navalny on February 8 might have some effect on the presidential election less than six weeks away. The fact that they haven't and won't is a clear sign of the nature of the election.

Urals-based journalist and blogger Aleksei Shaburov (here is an RFE/RL interview with him from January 2016) has written a tight analysis of the significance of Navalny's revelations, including the fact that Prikhodko evidently conducted a secret meeting about Russian foreign policy on the territory of a NATO country, Norway.

"Obviously Prikhodko could not fly to Norway secretly: border guards definitely knew about his movements and, possibly, the Norwegian security services. Doesn't this put Russia's national security in danger?" Shaburov wrote.