The graph shows higher support for United Russia in precincts reporting higher turnout.
October 16, 2009
After the December 2007 Duma elections and March 2008 presidential election (hello, Dmitry Medvedev!), some intrepid Russian bloggers and independent election observers performed some heroic work to highlight the extent of the election fraud in Russia. I wrote about their work here, paying particular attention to some meticulous statistical analysis that was done. If you want the full story, get a copy of “The Forensics Of Election Fraud: Russia And Ukraine” by U.S.-based professors Mikhail Maygkov and Peter Ordeshook and Dmitry Shakin of Moscow’s Academy of National Economy.
Now Russia’s bloggers are at it again, putting the microscope to the official results of the October 11 Moscow City Duma elections, in which, according to official results United Russia won 66 percent of the vote and 32 of the 35 council seats. That’s right, under the grossly unfair seat-allocation system that they instituted before the vote, 66 percent of the vote translates into 91 percent of the seats. Official turnout in Moscow was put at about 35 percent.
A blogger named kireyev posted on his LiveJournal blog an analysis of all the more than 3,000 polling stations in Moscow, using official data from the Central Election Commission. His figures show compellingly that the higher the reported turnout at a particular polling station, the higher the vote total for United Russia was there. That is, all the “above average” votes seem to have gone to the ruling party.
Kireyev then analyzed the 146 polling stations that reported 20 percent turnout or less, figuring that these precincts had the least fraud, at least in the form of ballot-box stuffing. He found that among these stations, the results were: United Russia, 46 percent; the Communist Party, 21 percent; the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR), 9.8 percent; Yabloko, 8.3 percent; A Just Russia, 8 percent; and Patriots of Russia, 3.1 percent.
Another blogger, Andrei A., took Kireyev’s numbers a bit further and calculated that the actual turnout for the Moscow elections was about 20 percent and that United Russia polled about 42 percent. He estimated that the average fraud among all polling stations was 15 percent of the ballots, while the maximum fraud reached more than 30 percent in some precincts.
A third blogger, avmalgin, got a hold of the voter protocols for polling station No. 1,702 in Moscow. That document shows 192 votes for United Russia, 98 for the Communist Party, 50 for A Just Russia, 38 for Yabloko, 37 for the LDPR, and 11 for the Patriots of Russia. However, the website of the Central Election Commission, of which the blogger presents a screenshot, shows the exact same results for all the parties – except for United Russia. By official results, United Russia got 742 votes. That is, United Russia’s percentage was magically raised from 45 percent to 74 percent.
These bloggers and others like them are doing brave work. Central Election Commission head Vladimir Churov has already compared those who are reporting on the fraud to "terrorists" and has threatened to prosecute them.
With any luck, though, we’ll be seeing a lot more of this information in the coming days. If you spot any, please forward them to me.
-- Robert Coalson
Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov (left) and LDPR head Vladimir Zhirinovsky at a press conference in the State Duma on October 14
October 15, 2009
So now we're supposed to believe that Vladimir Zhirinovsky and Gennady Zyuganov are the last great defenders of Russian democracy? They were shocked, appalled, and offended that the Kremlin would --ghasp! -- fix an election and decided to make a stand.
Yeah, right. Clearly something else is going on here.
Following up on Robert Coalson's post earlier today, there are more than a few signs out there that Wednesday's walkout of the State Duma by the so-called loyal opposition -- Zhirinovsky's LDPR, Zyugnov's Communists, and A Just Russia -- was a stage-managed affair that was given a green light at the very highest levels.
For one thing, Zhirinovsky, who initiated the walkout, doesn't do anything of this magnitude without an underlying motive (and that motive is never the advancement of democracy), and without prompting from his masters in the Kremlin.
And as Danila Galperovich of RFE/RL's Russian Service points out in a commentary today, the floor speeches by LDPR deputies that sparked the walkout, ostensibly in protest of alleged falsifications in the October 11 local elections, "were obviously rehearsed note for note."
Moreover, the parliamentary rebellion received extensive -- and largely respectful -- coverage on Russia's main state-run television channels. In the tightly controlled world of Russian television, that doesn't happen by accident.
"Could Gennadi Zyuganov, Sergei Mironov, and Vladimir Zhirinovsky with their followers summon the guts for a grandiose scandal without a condescending nod from their curators?" Mikhail Rostovsky asked rhetorically in a commentary in today's edition of "Moskovsky komsomolets."
So what's really going on?
In his commentary (available in Russian here and in English here), Galperovich spells out two possible scenarios, both of which are tied to power struggles at the highest level of the Russian elite.
The first of these pits Sergei Naryshkin, the Kremlin chief of staff, against his deputy Vladislav Surkov, the regime's unofficial ideologist.
In recent weeks, Russian media has been rife with speculation that President Dmitry Medvedev was about to sack Naryshkin as chief of staff and replace him with Surkov.
Naryshkin is closely affiliated with Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin, the leader of the siloviki faction of security service veterans surrounding Russia's de facto ruler, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Most Kremlin watchers believe he was put in his post to keep an eye on Medvedev, lest he get any crazy ideas about acting like he is actually the president.
According to some press reports, particularly a recent story in "Nezavisimaya gazeta," Medvedev's first choice to replace Naryshkin was Justice Minister Aleksandr Konovalov, the president's law school classmate. But lacking such latitude, Medvedev reportedly settled on Surkov, a powerful figure and skilful bureaucrat who is also Sechin's bitter rival.
According to this scenario, Naryshkin tasked Zhirinovsky with initiating the Duma revolt. The goal was to discredit, embarrass, and emasculate Surkov, whose portfolio includes keeping Russia's political parties docile and obedient.
A second scenario outlined by Galperovich also features Surkov, but this time not as the target of this elaborate special operation -- but as its instigator.
According to this version, it was Surkov who "activated" Zhirinovsky with the goal of discrediting and weakening Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov, head of the ruling United Russia faction and another close Sechin ally.
The Duma walkout was aimed at United Russia, which won a suspiciously large majority in local elections on October 11, and at Gryzlov in particular.
Surkov, the mastermind of Russia's authoritarian system of "sovereign democracy," has been engaged in a low-intensity bureaucratic war with Gryzlov for months over plans to revamp the country's party system.
In place of the current system of de facto one party rule by United Russia, Surkov has been seeking to create a pseudo multiparty system with several parties -- all beholden to the Kremlin -- "competed" for voters' allegiance.
United Russia would be the first among equals under the new plan, but it would share real power with other factions.
The lopsided victory United Russia scored in local elections was widely seen as an effort by Sechin and Gryzlov to crush Surkov's plan and maintain one-party dominance. And the LDPR inspired walkout, according to this scenario, was Surkov's counterpunch.
Both of these scenarios ultimately pit Surkov against Sechin. Both are also related to an ongoing struggle in the elite about Russia's future direction, with Sechin seeking to maintain the status quo, while Surkov (and Medvedev) appear to be seeking slight modifications.
According to the latest reports, Zhirinovsky (and A Just Russia) have agreed to end their boycott of the Duma, while the Communists are still holding out. The fallout in the coming days and weeks should provide more clues about which of these scenarios -- or another we haven't yet discerned -- is closer to reality.
-- Brian Whitmore
Analyst Dmitry Oreshkin says Medvedev has to make changes if he wants a second term.
October 15, 2009
The events in the Duma yesterday and today have naturally given birth to considerable speculation. Nothing in Russia, of course, is what it appears to be. It couldn’t be that elections were massively falsified and people are justifiably outraged about it. That would be too simple.
Grani.ru made the rounds of some leading analysts and here are excerpts from their comments:
Political commentator Kirill Rogov said the October 11 polls were a “traditional ‘vote gathering’ characteristic of authoritarian and semi-authoritarian regimes.”
Undoubtedly this demarche is not so much connected with the problem of democracy in the country as it is with definite splits within the political elite and among those who stand at the top of the political pyramid. The initiator was Zhirinovsky, who fairly consistently tailors his actions to the current circumstances. I think this is a serious demarche against United Russia and that group within the political leadership that relies on it. It seems intended to increase Medvedev’s influence, including his influence in parliament since those factions that walked out have appealed to him and intend to meet with him.
It is an interesting twist in the intra-clan struggle that demonstrates that the monolith of the power vertical against the background of the worsening economic situation has been shaken and that conflicts within it are inevitable.
He adds that the walkout was an intrigue “aimed at, in part, Surkov and the leadership of the Central Election Commission.”
INDEM foundation head Georgy Satarov doubts the situation “will produce any effect, since our senior leadership does not like to create dangerous precedents, as it has shown repeatedly.”
Since the federal authorities are fairly monolithic, it can’t be excluded that some factions will appear that will decide to use the situation for an attack on Luzhkov. This is a completely possible scenario. Even if this is the reaction, it will nonetheless be useful. It will create a precedent. The important thing here isn’t motive, but real actions. How will Medvedev act? He will most likely run off to consult with his patron and then will do what his patron tells him to do.
As always, commentator Dmitry Oreshkin was blunt:
Of course, this “kow-towing revolt” will be pacified and put down and everyone will return to the Mother Church. But it means a lot. Churov shrugs and says: “That’s politics.” Maybe Churov doesn’t know that elections are politics. He is used to the idea that politics are bad and he simply transcribes figures and everyone cringes and is grateful to him. He carries out the political task that was given to him when he was appointed: Putin is always right.
It makes sense that the rebels are appealing to the president to guarantee theconstitution, although they know perfectly well that Churov is Putin’s man, not Medvedev’s. Politics are at heart very primitive, clan interests. In this case, the losing clans – the LDPR, A Just Russia, the Communists, and, of course, all the democrats – they are all interested in having an honest, working system for counting votes. And here they are united with the president. If he wants to run for a second term, he cannot allow Putin’s team to count the votes.
Finally, journalist and political commentator Yevgeny Kiselyov notes that the three revolting factions are thoroughly in bed with the Kremlin, but adds that “in the history of Russia there have been situations when revolts were led by political forces that had previously been absolutely loyal to the ruling regime and had played strictly according to the rules.”
I don’t mean to say that this demarche will lead to any titanic changed in the political system of the country. It is more likely that it won’t than that it will. But there is the concept of “materials fatigue.” You can bend something over and over again but at some indefinable moment, it suddenly breaks. I think this is the case with our Russian political life. You can go against elementary common sense, against all civilized concepts of democracy five times, 10 times, 100,000 times, but on the 100,001st time, even the most loyal ones lose their patience.
I think it is obvious that this vertical – which has been under construction for 10 years – sooner or later will break. There are some constructs that simply cannot stand the test of time. I don’t mean to say that these events are the bomb that will do it, but it is not possible to keep building higher and higher, more and more vertical, forever. It will shake and it will break. Horizontal constructions are a lot more stable and long-lasting.
--
Robert Coalson
The loyal opposition walks out of the Duma on October 14.
October 14, 2009
The only surprising thing about the recent regional elections in Russia was the extent of the manipulation and falsification. Everyone knew United Russia would win enough to control everything, but no one expected they would leave so few crumbs even for the loyal “opposition,” including A Just Russia, the Communist Party, and the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia.
The theft was so egregious that those three factions walked out of the State Duma today and vowed not to return until they are granted a meeting with President Dmitry Medvedev (of course, this isn’t a problem for the Duma, which can continue working just fine because United Russia’s faction is so massive). They still hope that the “Good Tsar” will make everything right, although Medvedev has already stated that the vote gave United Russia the “moral and legal right” to govern.
Political analyst Dmitry Oreshkin’s take on the recent events was published on grani.ru and deserves citation at length:
I have always thought it was important to understand where the line of permissibility lies – how far can one go and how far is too far? Say, you can falsify elections by 20 percent, but not by 80 percent. In Chechnya, you can falsify 100percent, while in Moscow they tried to shift 25 percent and it produced this scandal. It is obvious that the Duma is completely controlled, that everyone in there got there by a Kremlin decision. It is clear that they are ready to wash the authorities’ feet and drink the water. But suddenly, at some tipping point, the drink gets a little too thick, and they begin to get nauseated. The most interesting thing is to catch that moment.
It would seem the authorities thought they could do what they wanted without limit. But in order to do things “without limit,” you have to resort to shooting. Every person has some minimum of self-respect and if there is not the direct threat of death or imprisonment, he will refuse to be taken for an idiot. In this situation, the authorities demanded that they be complete idiots because it is obvious to everyone that the elections were falsified. You don’t even need to prove it – it is obvious to anyone whose eyes are open. And so the day of anger has arrived, the moment of refusal. It had to come because if we develop this model further, the next step is to start building labor camps. Since deputies don’t face that threat, they still have some sense of dignity. This is good. This is a sign the mechanism has stopped, that we still have some living people.
If Medvedev intends to run for a second term, he must either remove [Central Election Commission head Vladimir] Churov, as Putin’s man, and put in his own man, or he must restore honest elections with some risk that he might lose. In any case, he must do something with the election commissions.
I think we are gradually approaching a political crisis and that there is nothing good in this. It could end up with shooting. The mechanism called elections is a political conflict that is regulated by law. Yes, there might be violations, some sort of falsifications, and if they don’t go past certain limits, the elite groups are willing to swallow them. But if they go beyond some limit, it becomes clear that the mechanism isn’t working and intra-elite competition moves outside the scope of regulation by law. And questions are decided either by summoning dangerous people in the middle of the night and shooting them, as happened under Stalin, or by returning and expanding the institute of honest elections. The problem comes when those who are afraid to lose power attempt to maintain it by violence. If that does not happen, then gradually under public pressure it will become necessary to put a respectable person (or respectable people) on the Central Election Commission and begin everything over again. That is democracy. And it doesn’t appear because we really want it to, but because powerful elite groups have no other way of peacefully reaching compromises.
Another interesting point is that the outrage is limited to the political elites. Average Russians seem, once again, to be indifferent to what has happened. Russia does not seem even close to experiencing anything like what we saw in Iran during the summer.
This offers Medvedev a golden opportunity to turn this potential crisis into a grand coup for himself, precisely by taking on the Good Tsar role that the outraged loyal oppositionists in the Duma are offering him. Churov is a political hack who is easily replaced. Even the return of his predecessor, Aleksandr Veshnyakov -- who engineered United Russia’s rise to power nationally and oversaw the managed 2004 reelection of Vladimir Putin, but who was not viewed as strong-handed enough to ensure the post-Putin transition – would be seen as a “victory for democracy” under the current circumstances.
Most likely, the lackeys in the Duma “opposition” that Oreshkin depicts so vividly would be satisfied with that gesture alone. They would be willing to “move forward” and would sweep last weekend’s travesty under the rug.
But Medvedev shouldn’t let them be so docile! He could easily go further and cast the blame – rightly – on the regional leaders who turned the elections into a farce. It has long been rumored that the Kremlin wants to get rid of Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov – now it has a “democratic” reason for doing so. People wouldn’t even notice that he replaced Luzhkov with some other pliable figure or that he gave Luzhkov some other government post (ambassador to South Ossetia?). And they’d certainly wouldn’t get around to insisting on restoring gubernatorial elections or making the systemic reforms that Oreshkin calls for.
In
a recent interview with RFE/RL’s Russian Service, former Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov said the real task of the genuine opposition in Russia is “to shape public opinion about what is happening.” He says that change will come only when the Kremlin sees that a tipping point has been reached for a wider range of the population than just the elites that Oreshkin talks about. If this happens, he says, “the authorities will see that society is changing and it will understand that people might come out into the streets if expectations are formed that there will be normal elections in 2011 or 2012 and if those expectations are dashed.”
Only this kind of pressure can push the authorities – even the “liberal” Medvedev – to embark on real democratization. But it seems like a quixotic hope. RFE/RL’s Russian Service recently produced
a video report about the return of a praising reference to Stalin to an inscription in the Kurskaya metro station in Moscow. At the two minute mark of the video, one typical Muscovite sums up the tide that Kasyanov and others are swimming against.
“Why not,” a middle-aged woman in an orange shirt says. “If they think it is necessary, why not? I’m for it.”
--
Robert Coalson