Election commission finding could disqualify anti-war Boris Nadezhdin from running

Russia’s elections commission has said it found “dead souls” among the more than 100,000 signatures of support submitted by Boris Nadezhdin, the sole anti-war candidate in next month’s presidential election, in a sign that he could be disqualified from a carefully managed ballot meant to deliver victory for Vladimir Putin.

Nadezhdin, a veteran politician who has associated with Kremlin insiders and the opposition to Putin, has been waging a last-minute campaign to get on the ballot for the election, with thousands of Russians standing for hours in the freezing cold to add their signature in his support.

While Nadezhdin has not yet been disqualified, Friday’s briefing at the central elections commission indicated that he could be removed in the run-up to the vote. He has been summoned to the commission on Monday for a review of the “errors” among his signatures.

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    • remotelove@lemmy.caEnglish
      4·
      10 months ago

      Sure, your statement is true. However, it is out of context and irrelevant to the point.

      The illusion is democracy and that the people are in control of their government. To make sure any election looks “fair”, you need a little bit of drama. Putin must have an opponent for this illusion to work.

      This has little to do with fear. If anything, it’s reducing fear in the populus by saying: “See! We are a democracy. The people still get to have their elections and here is an opponent to prove it.” The people are placated and life goes on. I have some fairly interesting theories about why the election is even allowed, but this is not the place for that speculation.

      (Didn’t Putin do a little prime minister shuffle a couple of years ago? The person who was temporarily president is proving to be just as toxic and is also calling for nuking the world, I believe.)

      Either the opponent gracefully loses, he gets thrown out of a window or gets a long vacation to some random corner of Siberia.

      If anything, it’s the illusion of hope that is more destructive than fear, in this case.