Russia votes for parliament, Putin triumph expected
Pastor Dale Morgan
Russia votes for parliament, Putin triumph expected*
By Yuri Maltsev
Reuters
Saturday, December 1, 2007; 6:40 PM
VLADIVOSTOK, Russia (Reuters) - Residents of Russia's remote Far East
cast ballots for a new parliament in sub-zero temperatures on Sunday to
open voting overshadowed by opposition accusations that pro-Kremlin
forces enjoy an unfair advantage.
The first of around 96,000 polling stations across this sprawling
nation, in the far northeastern province of Chukotka bordering Alaska,
opened at 8 a.m. local time Sunday (3 p.m. EST Saturday), election
officials said.
More than 100 million Russians are eligible to vote in an election
widely viewed as a referendum on President Vladimir Putin. Pollsters
predict his United Russia party will win an overwhelming victory and
secure more than 60 percent of seats.
Putin, 55, is by far Russia's most popular politician after presiding
over eight years of an economic boom. He aims to retain influence after
stepping down as president in early 2008 and says a strong mandate from
voters will give him that right.
Two hours after voting started, polling stations opened in Vladivostok,
Russia's gateway into the Pacific and a naval base.
"I voted for Putin," 68-year-old pensioner Valentin Nenashev told
Reuters after casting the first ballot at polling station No. 130 in
central Vladivostok. "I voted for a better life, for stability in the
country."
He said he had come so early because he planned to go fishing straight
afterwards. On a crisp and frosty morning, pensioners and sailors in
black peajackets were trickling into this station with more than 2,000
registered voters.
OPPOSITION WOES
Increasingly marginalized opposition parties have complained that
numerous election rule changes, heavily skewed media coverage, repeated
instances of government pressure on voters and Putin's own campaigning
have made the contest unfair.
Publication of opinion polls is banned in the days before the vote but
pollsters say the Communists are the only party other than United Russia
assured of exceeding the 7 percent threshold to qualify for seats in the
new Duma.
Putin has insisted the elections will be completely democratic. He has
attacked foreigners for "poking their snotty noses" into Russia's
internal affairs and accused opposition politicians of being stooges for
Western powers.
The West's main election watchdog body, the ODIHR, will not be
monitoring the vote. It pulled out after a row with Moscow over delays
in issuing visas.
Just around 300 foreign observers, roughly half of them from ex-Soviet
states, had been accredited to watch the election. The Kremlin says
checks by foreign monitors are unnecessary because Russia has high
standards of democracy.
PREDICTABLE RESULT
The predictable result of Sunday's vote and a dull campaign lacking
debate on key issues have generated apathy among voters. This has
sparked an official push to get the turnout up to at least the 56
percent figure in the last Duma elections in 2003.
Last-minute efforts to boost participation were going on across the
country, with mobile phone companies sending text messages to
subscribers telling them to vote and some state companies ordering staff
to cast ballots at work on Sunday.
The small liberal party Yabloko complained to the Central Electoral
Commission a TV broadcast by Putin on Thursday telling Russians to vote
for United Russia had broken election rules.
"This was a flagrant violation of the legislation, an abuse of office in
the interests of one party," Sergei Mitrokhin, Yabloko deputy chairman,
told Ekho Moskvy radio on Saturday.
Central Electoral Commission chairman Vladimir Churov has said Putin has
a right to campaign publicly for his party because he is a registered
candidate.
The right-wing SPS party, the target of several attacks by the
authorities in the final stages of the campaign, complained that riot
police had attempted to break into its offices in the southern city of
Krasnodar. Police refused comment.
(Editing by Stephen Weeks)