“Hello mama. It’s me, Vladimir. I won the elections”
By Sean at 2 December, 2007, 10:58 pm
Putin must love it when a plan comes together. With around 85 percent of precincts reporting, United Russia has captured an albeit predictable landslide. The numbers break down as follows:
- United Russia: 63.2 percent
- Communist Party: 11.7 percent
- Liberal Democratic Party: 8.4 percent
- Just Russia: 8 percent
- Other Parties: 8.7 percent
The percentage scraps leftover went to parties like Yabloko and Union of Right Forces who didn’t garner the needed 7 percent to make the cut. And while the losers will scream foul, the winner, United Russia, will be able to take their victory as a sign that the population supports their consolidation of power. For Russia’s fledgling liberal parties, the election engenders the old Leninist dictum: What is to be done?
The liberals will certainly try to postpone dealing with this question until after the Presidential Elections in March. But after that it seems that they will have to honestly evaluate their political future. Will they continue as before? Will they make a strategic merge and pool resources and constituencies? Or will they decide that once again liberalism has no future in Russia and for the time being, it might be better to grease the system from the inside. If the latter course is taken, some will certainly abandon political principle and join United Russia. Others will piggyback on Just Russia and hedge their bets that the Kremlin created opposition party has a political future ahead of it.
And electoral corruption there was. Despite the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe’s (PACE) Central Asian rep Kimmo Kiljunen’s insistence that there would be no “ballot rigging.” “I see law and order and I see people going to vote,” he said. Well, in a sense he’s right if you consider the elections he normally monitors in Central Asia. Russia’s elections must looks like shining beacons of the democratic process compared to those.
Still, even if Kiljunen’s special perspective is considered, there can’t be any denial of electoral malfeasance. The press was flooded with incidents over the last week. To make sure everything went as planned, the last day of campaigning was coupled with the police seizure of the entire press run of Arkhangelskii obozrevatel. The Central Electoral Commission claimed that the paper violated electoral law because it published voter surveys in its Friday addition. Election law forbids the publication of polls five days before voting. According to the paper’s editor Oleg Grigorash the seizure was spearheaded by Arkhandelsk mayor Alexander Donskoi “so that all information about the disgraced governor and also materials about the upcoming Duma elections were not revealed to the citizens of Arkhangelsk.” In Kransodarsk, police raided the offices of SPS. SPS activists barricaded the door to save them from the police. Why did the police storm the offices? They never found out. I wonder if these kinds of incidents are what the Moscow Times means when it claims that “regional committees were ordered to resort to any means necessary, including fraud, to ensure that United Russia won 70 to 80 percent of the vote.” If the electoral returns now cited are any indication, once again the regions did not fulfill the plan. They should have all followed Ramzan Kadyrov’s lead. United Russia scored 99 percent of the vote in Chechnya.
But now its all over. And no one was happier than Putin himself. “Thank god the election campaign is over,” he told reporters after voting with wife in tow around 1 pm. Turn out was high. Around 60 percent of the 108 million registered voters cast votes. Two voters, however, took the opportunity to nullify their ballots. Garry Kasparov and Eduard Limonov, amid a crowd of reporters, crossed out their ballots and wrote in “Other Russia.” “I voted against all because the authorities deprive the citizens of Russia their constitutional rights,” Kasparov said after dropping his self-disqualified vote in the ballot box. I’m sure in this instance that the authorities were happy to see Kasparov and Limonov do their job for them. What’s next for the dynamic duo? Another protest, of course, today 3 December, whimsically titled “The Funeral of Elections.”
Of course, Nashi’s exit polls lacked any surprise. 20,000 pro-Kremlin youths calculated that 61.88 percent of vote went for United Russia, almost pegging the official count to the number. With accuracy like that , it’s no wonder then never managed to erect those tents to fight off would-be colored revolutionary scoundrels.
Lastly, I think this Putin joke sums up the whole mess:
Putin calls his mother on the phone and says: “Hello mama. It’s me, Vladimir. I won the elections”. Putin’s mother responds:
“Really? Honestly?”. “Mama,” Putin answers. “Can you please not nag me about that.”
Just think. This election was just a dress rehearsal for March. Then, the gloves will really come off.
Popularity: 4% [?]
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Comments
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However, doesn’t UR have fewer seats in the current Duma than it did in the last one?
As unlikely as it is to happen, it seems to me that the minority parties need to form some sort of coalition or new party.
I’m curious just how monolithic United Russia is in its political opinions. I realize they will essentially operate as a rubber stamp for Putin’s policies, but I have to believe their members opinions are a bit more diverse than that.
Since it’s largely a business, I’m not sure the members’ opinions matter.
I don’t know about that … in the long run, members of the “business” might find it favorable to form their own group of opinions or switch sides.
I had seen references to opinion polls prior to the election that indicated Putin approval ratings as high as 80% in the weeks prior to this election. It seems that this election result is almost a failure in light of that.
If CM is right, and United Russia has actually lost some seats in the Duma, and “Putin’s Plan” was to take over as Prime Minister of a substantially strengthened Russian parliament – is the “Plan” a failure?
“I had seen references to opinion polls prior to the election that indicated Putin approval ratings as high as 80% in the weeks prior to this election. It seems that this election result is almost a failure in light of that.”
I don’t know. The ratings reflect trust in Putin, and not in UR.
FWIW, here’s the makeup of the Fourth (2003) Duma:
Fourth Duma
UR: 66.00%
KPRF: 10.44%
LDPR: 6.44%
Rodina 9.77%
Independent 4.67%
So, UR has lost (a few) seats relative to 2003, assuming the stats Sean has are consistent with the final tally.
No, UR will have MORE seats than in the 2003 Duma, for (at least) three reasons:
(i) the abolition of single-member constituencies
(ii) (associated with the above): the prohibition of nominally independent candidates
(even though nominally independent, many of these went on to support UR or join or otherwise associate with the UR faction in the Duma)
and
(iii) the increase in the quota required for parties to obtain representation from 5% to 7% (as well as other changes to regulations about party membership requirements, etc)
Also, I’m not sure where that “66% figure” comes from : the figures I have (sourced previously from the electoral commission website) gave UR 37.6% of the party-list vote in 2003, and a total of 222 deputies.
On the basis of the results announced today, we can expect UR to have in the region of 315 deputies in the new Duma
How about this from St. Petersburg:
Петербургские лидеры «Единой России» и даже губернатор Валентина Матвиенко считают результаты партии в городе — уверенной победой. Несмотря на то, что результат в родном городе кандидата №1 и президента России Владимира Путина — самый низкий по стране. Если даже общефедеральный, то есть усредненный показатель партии власти составляет более 64 процентов, то по Петербургу он – всего 50,33 процента. По сравнению с выборами в ЗакС в марте 2007-го года, когда «Единая Россия» со скрипом набрала немногим более 36 процентов, этот результат — действительно победа. Впрочем и в марте, когда весь город говорил о провале ЕдРа, активисты партии тоже говорили о том, что у них — очень хорошие результаты.
I don’t know. The ratings reflect trust in Putin, and not in UR.
Right – so isn’t that about a 20% discrepancy between what he preached to the voting populace to do for the past few months … and what they actually did?
I think both groups are right … Yedim Rossiyu won 37% of the vote in 2003, but as of January 2005 it controls 305 seats out of 450, or about 67.8% (so sayeth that fallible resource, wikipedia.)
If they end up with 315 seats, that would be a slight increase from where they appear to be today, even though they won less than 67.8% of the popular vote. I suspect that is due to the 7% rule, in effect that 8.7% “Other Parties” is scratched isn’t it … and the rest of the Duma pie divided by the +7% survivors?
PS:
44.5% of Russians voting in the United States chose United Russia
17.5% – SPS
16.7% – Yabloko
http://gazeta.ru/news/lenta/2007/12/03/n_1148376.shtml
PPS: I lifted that info from Jesse Heath, credit where credit id due.
That’s interesting, Chris. I didn’t know that Russian’s abroad could vote. I would imagine that the Russian diaspora community here in LA probably voted for UR. And there is no doubt that the Russians in Israel voted for UR too. But I will check on that.
Back in the year 2,000, Sasha Kalugin–a Moscow friend, a good man, and an accomplished artist (he describes himself as a художник-иронист)–titled one of his creations “Vladimir Vladimirovich.” It can be seen here:
http://www.artkalugin.com/9177.html
Seven years later his “Vladimir Vladimirovich” is more timely than ever.
I knew Russians abroad could vote, but only because Katja and I actually have been discussing this.
She shirked her responsibilities and didn’t vote.
Shame on her.
And yes – we can vote abroad. At embassies.
)
But usually we are ignored by both opposition and foreign observers (shame on you Sean).
By the way – this is not that small number of voters. Enough for couple of seats at least. And easy one.
Among my contacts UR got 75% and KPRF 25%…
It’s all Katja’s fault SPS didn’t clear 7%.
Seriously, with all this talk about the Kremlin supposedly fiddling with the vote, doesn’t the result tally very closely with the Levada Center (and other) opinion poll predictions? If the supposed fiddling was a decisive factor, one would have expected a greater difference.
(An exception here MAY be in the increased number of Just Russia votes relative to the poll predictions.)
Oh, this is funny:
According to Limonov in Kommersant, the NBP had conducted its own polls and determined that 22% of Muscovites were willing to vote for Other Russia!