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The Russians voted for a new parliament on the third and final day, and the pro-Kremlin ruling party is expected to maintain a majority of seats.
Voting has ended in the Russian parliamentary elections, and the country’s election commission stated that preliminary results from a limited number of polling stations on Sunday showed that the country’s united Russia party loyal to the Kremlin took the lead.
According to the committee’s data, the results of nearly 9% of polling stations in the country showed that the United Russia Party received 38% of the votes from the 225 delegates assigned to the party list. The other 225 will be selected by individual races.
The fragmented results make it unclear whether the United Russia Party, which firmly supports President Vladimir Putin, will retain its two-thirds majority in the parliament, allowing him to amend the constitution.
This election is widely regarded as an important part of Putin’s consolidation of his power before the 2024 presidential election, in which control of the State Duma or Parliament will be the key.
Russians across 11 time zones voted on the third and last day of Sunday. Opinion polls revealed a large number of reports of violations, including flooding of votes, insufficient security, and pressure on election supervisors.
In this year’s vote, most opposition politicians and activists were banned from running for election because the Russian authorities vigorously suppressed protests and dissent.
After the authorities declared that the organization associated with the imprisoned Kremlin’s most prominent enemy, Alexey Navalny, was an “extremist,” the election lacked a clear opposition presence.
By Sunday afternoon—the government allowed the last day of the three-day voting this year on the grounds of coronavirus concerns—the turnout rate was only over 40%, and voting in the Russian Far East and Siberia had ended.
Russian media, opposition politicians, and election observers have been reporting violations since Friday morning, when there were unexpectedly long lines at polling stations in Moscow and other cities.
Some people in the line told reporters that they were forced to vote by their employer, usually a state-run agency.
Last weekend, there were multiple voting videos circling on social media. In some areas, there have been reports of “carousel voting” events—a group of voters cast multiple votes at different polling stations—and clashes between election supervisors and voting staff.
Ella Pamfilova, chairman of the Russian Central Election Commission, confirmed that there have been at least eight balloting incidents in six regions of Russia. So far, the committee has invalidated 7,465 ballots in 14 regions.
The United Russia Party won more than 54% of the votes in 2016. This was the last time a parliamentary election was held. Due to years of low living standards, its popularity has been declining.
Navalny’s allies have urged the Russians to follow his tactical voting strategy, which is to support the candidate who is most likely to defeat the United Russia Party in a particular district.
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