Lenin's Election and 4 March 2012

Free and fair elections have not had a long, rich or impressive history in Russia. The first one was held only in December 1917 under the leadership of Lenin:  a Constitutional Assembly was elected that was supposed to determine the new form of government for the country as the tsarist autocracy had crumbled under the force of revolution. Lenin assumed that his party would win which would strengthen his political position. When instead it only received a quarter of the vote, he quickly changed his mind about this election nonsense.  The Constitutional Assembly met one time, was thereupon forcibly disbanded by Lenin and that was the end of free and fair elections in Russia until Boris Yeltsin was elected president in 1991.


Meanwhile, Election Day has come to Russia!  On 4 March 2012 citizens voted to decide who would be president of Russia for the next six years.
.

Billboard advertising the elections: 

4 March, Russian Presidential Elections

Our Land, Our Election, Our President!

Loudspeakers at various strategic points remind the passing crowds that today is election day and every citizen of the Russian Federation has the right to vote.

By American standards, Russian election campaigns are incredibly restrained.  Once in awhile though, some verve appears.  The truck here, covered in red, white and blue balloons, displays the sign "The Admiralty District Votes!"

And indeed, people trotted off to the polls.  Election locales were spread across the city, usually in schools, universities, or other governmental institutions. They were clearly marked, and easily recognizable by the red banners proclaiming "Place to Vote," police officers in fur hats pacing in front, and the steady stream of people entering and exiting.

Typical voting locale in a school not far from Fontanka Canal, with red banner over the columns and police officers making sure the peace is held.

Interior of an average Petersburgian voting locale in a school, decorated for the day with a few clusters of red, white, and blue balloons. In the background, people are signing in. In the lower right hand corner the glass urn, decorated with the Russian double eagle, is already filling up with ballots. 

All locales were outfitted with web cams and often had several "observers" sitting and doing their observational job, as well as some bored police officers hanging out. Musical accompaniment was not rare. One school had a juvenile choir singing "You're the best, better than all the rest;" in another, music was piped in on a loud speaker, unusually, "Ave Maria."

 

The ballot, with each of the five candidates and a short description thereof. This ballot was cast for Prokhorov.

Voting is hard work, and every election locale has a modest assortment of food and non-alcoholic drink available for purchase at the "buffet" so one can appropriately recover from electional stress.

Patriotism was out in pretty full force and more than the usual number of Russian flags were flying around town.

Well, the results of this great presidential election are now in and there aren't any roulettian upsets here.  

Putin: 63.64%
Zyuganov: 17.18%
Prokhorov: 7.94%
Zhirinovsky: 6.22%
Mironov: 3.22%
Invalid votes: 1.16%
Voter turnout: 65.25%


It looks like Putin will be with us for at least the next six years.... Who can say at this point if it will be a good or bad thing?