Photo: Sergei Guneyev / AP
Vladimir Putin (71) has been Russia’s strongman for approximately 8,750 days. He is still almost 2,000 days behind Josef Stalin – the Soviet dictator from 1924 until his death in 1953.
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Less than 20 minutes ago
The president has confirmed that he will stand in the election on 17 March 2024.
– There he will be re-elected! Regional administrators claim that he has ordered 80 per cent support and 70 per cent turnout, chuckles Professor Jardar Østbø at the Department of Defense Studies.
If Putin sits for another six years, he will pass Stalin by a couple of hundred days by the spring of 2030.
– Stalin sat for 29 years. Will Putin run again in 2030?
– The way it looks now, Putin will sit for as long as possible. At an earlier stage, he appeared to be bored and apparently looking for some kind of solution to transfer power to a successor. A lot has happened since then, and now there is so much at stake, so he will probably try his best to sit as long as possible, Jardar Østbø answers.
The professor adds:
– Now both the president and Joe Biden are 81 years old. and the likely Republican presidential candidate Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is 77 years old.in the United States older than Putin.
Photo: VALERY SHARIFULIN / AFP / NTB
– But when Joe Biden stumbles, it doesn’t turn out very well. If Putin does the same, it is a much bigger problem, because it can initiate dynamics both in the people and not least in the elite, where people can start to position themselves to take over. So it’s important not to catch a cold – but to look young and strong!
Info
Longest-serving Russian and Soviet leaders
Joseph Stalin: 10,636 days.
Vladimir Putin: 8,745 days.
Leonid Brezhnev: 6,601 days.
Boris Yeltsin: 3,096 days.
Mikhail Gorbachev: 2,480 days.
Sea view
Putin is 71 years old. The independent media Medusa has written that the Kremlin will prevent young candidates from standing in the election, because Putin will appear as “grandfather”.
– There are Telegram channels that spread conspiratorial content that Putin is already dead. Such claims are a bigger problem for an authoritarian leader than in a democracy, says Professor Østbø.
Info
Putin as Russia’s strongman
31. December 1999: Is appointed by Boris Yeltsin as interim president.
Mars 2000: Election for a new president with 53.4 percent.
Mars 2004: Re-elected as president with 71.9 percent.
2008–2012: The constitution did not allow him to be president, but was in reality Russia’s strongman as prime minister *).
Mars 2012: Election for president with 64.3 percent.
Mars 2018: Re-elected as president with 77.5 percent.
*) The constitution was amended before the presidential election in 2012.
Sea view
– Will Putin, as in the past, try to make it look like he has real competition?
– It probably has a lower priority this time – both the war and Putin’s age taken into account. And not least the fact that the regime relies more on direct repression than it has ever done before.
– Which means that Putin needs to get even more votes than before?
– Yes, with the level of repression we are seeing now, Putin must have a very good election result. Previously, there was less propaganda and greater media diversity, and there were greater opportunities for the opposition. Then he didn’t need to get such a high percentage as now. Now it will look bad if the result is not very good.
Vladimir Putin received 77 percent of the vote in the 2018 election. Six years earlier, he got 64 percent.
Photo: Mikhail Klimentyev / AP / NTB
– Who are standing as counter-candidates to Putin?
– I think the Kremlin will be careful. In 2018, they had the communist Pavel Grudinin with them, who proved more popular than they might have imagined. He received almost 12 percent of the vote. This time it will probably be the communist leader Gennadij Ziuganov, who will be 80 next year, answers Jardar Østbø.
– Other candidates?
– The ultra-nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky is dead, but it would be natural if his party stood for election. And in that case, it could be the new party leader, Leonid Slutsky, who himself has “thought out loud” about this. He has been accused by several female Russian journalists of sexual harassment. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a big disadvantage for a Russian politician, but he is a toothless candidate anyway.
PROFESSOR: Jardar Østbø. Photo: Department of Defense Studies
– How do you think the election will be organized now?
– It is a big job both for the Presidential Administration and the apparatus out in the regions to put everything in order, mobilize business leaders to pressure workers to vote, arrange transport to the polling stations and so on. In the worst case, they have to resort to direct electoral fraud, such as stuffing ballot papers into the ballot boxes. But it doesn’t look good, because it’s so visible. Ideally, they would be able to carry out this demonstration of power for Putin without having to resort to such means.
– What does the real opposition do?
– None of them are allowed to stand as candidates. Alexei Navalny is in prison, and his people recommend voting for anyone but Putin. Without it being particularly important.
– Is the election important for Putin?
– Yes absolutely!
– Why?
– Because it will show that he is a legitimate president. All heads of state want it. And then they can get a cheap point…
– Which one?
– If Russia conducts its presidential election, while due to the war it will not be possible to have a presidential election in Ukraine, answers Professor Østbø.
JOURNALIST: Jelena Milasjina. Photo: Ole Kristian Strøm / VG
The well-known Russian journalist Jelena Milashina completely agrees with Østbø’s assessment of the election’s significance for Putin:
– It is so important for Putin to be elected, because he believes that it shows that the Russian people like him – which of course is strange since there are no free elections. I would hardly call it an election, says the Novaja Gazeta journalist to VG.
– But for Putin it is important, not least after the large protests in 2011 and 2012 against the parliamentary elections at the time. Now there will probably be no protests, and then Putin will feel like he was legitimately elected by the Russian people.
Published:
Published: 28.12.23 at 04:15
2023-12-28 03:15:39
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