Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of opposition leader Aleksei Navalny, has urged Russians to follow through on her late husband's plan to hold a mass protest on election day by flocking to polling stations across the country at noon to cast ballots against incumbent Vladimir Putin or to spoil them.
In a video posted on social media on March 6, Navalnaya said the turnout of tens of thousands of supporters for Navalny's funeral last week in Moscow bolstered her belief that his pro-democracy campaign would continue despite his death in an Arctic prison in February.
"We need to use the election day to show that we exist and there are many of us. We are real, living people, and we are against Putin. You need to come to the voting station on the same day and at the same time – March 17 at noon," Navalnaya said in the video.
SEE ALSO: 'I Live In Navalny's Russia': Muscovites Speak Their Minds As They Say Farewell On Social MediaTwo weeks before his death under mysterious circumstances, Navalny had called on voters turn out en masse at noon on the voting days -- March 15-17 -- to form huge lines as a show of opposition during the presidential election.
Navalny, who announced the plan as he marked the third anniversary of his incarceration on charges widely believed to be politically motivated, said the idea behind the protest was to ensure the action was "completely legal and safe."
Given that turnout at noon is traditionally high, Navalny said the protest would make it "simply impossible" to identify those who vote against Putin, whom Navalny's family, supporters, and many Western leaders blame for the death of his most vocal critic.
"What to do next? The choice is yours. You can vote for any candidate except Putin. You can ruin the ballot, you can write 'Navalny' in big letters on it. And even if you don't see the point in voting at all, you can just come and stand at the polling station, and then turn around and go home," Navalnaya said in the March 6 video.
Separately on March 6, Boris Nadezhdin, whom election officials refused to register as a candidate for the vote, announced what he called the recruitment of "observers" for the election.
The 60-year-old anti-war politician, who has openly criticized Putin and the war he launched two years ago against Ukraine, did not say how the recruitment will work as he has no right to organize a monitoring process since his candidacy was rejected by election officials over what they deemed were invalid signatures of support in his application.
After her husband's death, Navalnaya, who lives in exile in Germany, said she would continue his work.
Navalny's team has also made the same pledge, emphasizing that the opposition will continue its fight against corruption and Putin's power apparatus.
Russian elections are tightly controlled by the Kremlin and are neither free nor fair but are viewed by the government as necessary to convey a sense of legitimacy.
The Kremlin's tight grip on politics, media, law enforcement, and other levers means Putin, who has ruled Russia as president or prime minister since 1999, is certain to win, barring a very big, unexpected development.