A video from a polling station in the small town of Gelendzhik in southern Russia is said to show an election official sitting on a stack of completed ballots for Putin’s United Russia party.
Ilona Grachevskaya, a local candidate for the Russian Communist Party, confronts the election official in the video she is now broadcasting on Russian social media on Telegram.
Jørn Holm-Hansen, a Russian expert and senior researcher at NIBR-OsloMet, describes the video as almost comical.
– The official sits on ballots that have been crossed with Putin’s United Russia party. He refuses to get up, but everyone can see from his expression on his face that he doesn’t have clean flour in his bag, Holm-Hansen tells Dagbladet.
– Show what is very clear now, like the previous elections: there are a lot of election fraud. Preferably “petty scams” of this kind. There may be election officials pushing thick piles of completed ballot papers into the polls.
Danger coming to Russia
It could have consequences
Arve Hansen, a Russian expert and consultant to the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, says the video of the election fraud could have consequences.
– The interesting thing is that she receives the support of the police officers who are supposed to take care of her. This case has now been published in the media and so the authorities need to react, says Hansen.
The case is now being discussed in various Russian media, both in the opposition, such as Kavkazskij Uzel, and in local non-opposition newspapers.
– It’s a sign that the Russian authorities are limiting themselves a bit in the pursuit, says Hansen.
sea View
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– Many understand
As colleague of the Helsinki Committee Inna Sangadzhieva also pointed out to Dagbladet, several opposition candidates have appeared on the electoral roll this round.
– Many of these do not talk about Putin or the war. The only thing they say clearly is that they are not happy with the situation. This is enough for people to understand where they are, says Hansen of the Helsinki Committee.
He says the goal of the campaigns is to highlight election fraud to the greatest extent possible.
– Nobody goes around thinking they can suddenly change the situation by democratic means. It’s about making it visible that there is opposition, he says.
He believes that many Russians see through the official narrative about redeployment of troops in Ukraine and that many understand that the war is not going Russia’s way.
– There is a lot to do in Russia. Suddenly you can have a spiral effect and the situation is beyond the control of the authorities, says Hansen.
– Shocked at the destruction
Surprising opposition
Local and regional elections took place on Sunday 11 September in various places in Russia. Russian authorities have tried even more than usual to prevent opposition candidates from running for election.
However, opposition candidates were found on several electoral rolls across the country.
It became clear on Monday that Putin-backed candidates were declared winners in most local elections. Therefore, Putin’s United Russia party retained the majority in most cases.
Election observers from the Golos organization believe there are a number of signs that indicate election fraud. However, this is rejected by the Russian authorities.
The Jabloko party, in Russian “apple”, can be considered a pure opposition party. Holm-Hansen is surprised that the Russian authorities have not completely prevented them from fielding the candidates.
– Their slogan is “For peace and freedom”. They can’t use the word “war,” but everyone understands what lies behind the slogan, says Holm-Hansen at the Oslo Met.
Even in the lists of the Communist Party, which was otherwise pro-Kremlin and aligned with the line of Putin’s ruling party, some critical candidates for the regime have run for elections this year.
– These candidates are often wiped out of the field before they can even stand for election. Authorities tend to find some formal errors, which they use as a pretext to prevent it, he says.
A number of critics of the regime have tried to get elected to city councils and district committees to mobilize disaffected voters and get a platform, says Holm-Hansen.
– But beyond that, it is probably clear that they will not gain any particular political power.
– He could have prevented the invasion
– He stank of treason
Electoral fraud is far from an unknown phenomenon in Russian elections. Holm-Hansen specifically points to electronic voting as the subject of this.
– There are many people who believe that digital votes offer even greater opportunities for cheating. During last year’s elections to the Duma, the Russian National Assembly, it was seen that digital votes to a greater extent than paper votes went in favor of Putin’s party, says Holm-Hansen.
– It smells like muffins. The most digitally competent are also the young people of the cities. This is not a group that votes for Putin’s party to a particularly large extent, quite the opposite, says Holm-Hansen.
It also says that more than half a million voters in Moscow had cast their electronic vote before 11.30 am on Sunday election day.
– Many thought he smelled like cheating.
He doesn’t think the elections will have major political consequences in Russia, as the country is now.
Both Norwegian experts and Kremlin-friendly Russian blogger Igor Girkin pointed out that the Russians may have to declare a full-scale war to keep pace militarily in Ukraine.
Father Putin
It will also mean a full mobilization of Russian conscripts.
– Will a mobilization affect the internal political situation around Putin?
– Then he will be able to create problems. So far, Putin has used enlisted soldiers in poor areas of Russia, where people don’t have many other ways to make an income, he says.
Putin risks losing further support in larger cities, where citizens have more political power and more often obtain alternative information to Kremlin propaganda.
Claimed that Putin fired: Dissolve
Several polls indicate that soldiers in Ukraine are minimally from middle-class Moscow families.
– People I have contact with in Moscow say that life is relatively normal there now. It will be something completely different if he comes in and asks these people to risk their life and physical safety. If they suddenly see their children and cousins involved in a senseless war of aggression on the neighboring country, Putin is sure to be in trouble.
– At the same time, there is a danger that Putin will intensify the repression even further, says Holm-Hansen.
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