PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS
Russians have not discovered that there are better things than turnips
By all accounts the Russian presidential elections, scheduled for March 18 to April 1, will be a one-horse race. The winner will be the incumbent, President Vladimir Putin, who apparently enjoys an 80% approval rating and is running against a batch of no-hopers who have been allowed by the Kremlin to participate to make a phony election appear "democratic". Though Putin might get up to 90% of the vote, the playing field is anything but level. Most opposition and critical media have been neutralised by Kremlin fiat, and public street protest has been criminalised. His strongest rival, Alexei Navalny, is prevented from running, having been found guilty of trumped-up criminal charges. Even so, everything may not go Putin’s way. The Kremlin fears that the election turnout could be the lowest yet. Navalny is pushing for an election boycott, in effect an opposition protest vote. As a Moscow paper put it: "Putin’s real opposition is a collective shrug." Surveys by the independent Levada Ce...
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