(Adnkronos) – Voting takes place this weekend, in some cases already starting today, in 80 regions in Russia for local elections that could hold some surprises. Within the framework of Putin’s rhetoric of replacing elites with veterans from the front, there are among the candidates also 1,400 former soldiers, even though for powerless positions, with dozens of them possibly involved in war crimes committed in Ukraine according to an analysis by Novaya Gazeta. More than 2,500 of the candidates have a criminal record. 55 million Russians are called to the polls to elect the governors of 20 regions, including Sevastopol and Kursk, 11 legislative assemblies and 25 city councils. It will be possible to vote in person at the polling stations or, in 24 regions, also online.
“Despite the general trend in domestic politics, Russia remains a large and diversified country where elections can take different forms. In some locations, there has been no political competition for twenty years, in others, a hidden or even open clash between local elites with independent candidates challenging outgoing regional leaders,” explain analysts Ksenia Smolyakova and Vadim Ternovoy in an analysis by Electoral Atlas, quoted by Moscow Times. The elections for the governors of Arkhangelsk and Irkutsk do not have a predictable outcome.
In Irkutsk “the most competitive election in the country” is expected: the outgoing governor, the Kremlin-backed silovik Igor Kobzev, is challenged by the former governor, a member of the communist party, Sergei Levchenko, elected governor for the first time in 2015 and forced to resign in 2019 after the arrest of his son for corruption in a case considered by many to be politically motivated. His resignation was met with a protest demonstration in his support in Irkutsk.
In Arkhangelsk, the outgoing governor of United Russia, Alexander Tsybulsky, called in 2020 by Putin to replace the then governor Igor Orlov, forced to resign following protests against a landfill next to the Shiys railway station, faces the local real estate tycoon, Roman Lyabikhov, who is running with the Communist Party.
Tsybulsky, former governor of the Nenets district, included in the region, then won the elections, according to the consolidated script of the vote after the Kremlin’s ‘ad interim’ call to allow the candidate time to manage administrative resources in his favor, but only after the protest leader, Oleg Mandrykin, had been prevented from running. Lyabikhov, who has consolidated relations in the Moscow power apparatus and resources, could prove to be a formidable opponent for Tsybulsky.
