- VIVA.co.id/Arianti Widya
Russia – Russia's Election Commission has officially registered President Vladimir Putin as a candidate for the presidential election to be held in March, a vote that will almost certainly win him another six-year term.
Putin, 71, is running as an independent, but he retains tight control over the Russian political system that he has built over 24 years in power.
With leading critics who could challenge him jailed or living abroad and most independent media banned, his re-election in the March 15-17 presidential election is believed by experts to be a landslide victory.
Presiden Rusia Vladimir Putin (Doc: The Sundaily)
- VIVA.co.id/Natania Longdong
In 2018, Putin also ran as an independent candidate, rejecting the United Russia party that nominated him in 2012. With his approval rating hovering around 80 percent, Putin is far more popular than the United Russia Party.
The center officially approved Putin to run after reviewing 315,000 signatures collected by his campaign team from 89 regions in Russia.
Russian election law requires independent candidates to show at least 300,000 signatures to be on the ballot.
The commission has approved three other candidates nominated by parties represented in parliament who do not need to collect signatures: Nikolai Kharitonov of the Communist Party, Leonid Slutsky of the nationalist Democratic Liberal Party, and Vladislav Davankov of the New People's Party.
These three parties largely support Kremlin policies. Kharitonov ran against Putin in 2004 and finished in second place.
Boris Nadezhdin, a 60-year-old liberal politician who serves as a local legislator in a city near Moscow, also wants to run.
He has publicly called for an end to the conflict in Ukraine and the start of a dialog with the West.
Thousands of Russians have lined up across the country to give their signatures in support of Nadezhdin's candidacy so he can qualify to run, an unusual show of opposition sympathy in a tightly controlled political landscape that poses a challenge to the Kremlin.
The Central Election Commission is expected to review Nadezhdin's files later this week to decide whether to register him in the election.
Under constitutional reforms he drafted, Putin is qualified to run twice more for six-year terms, allowing him to stay in power until 2036.
