Putin-A Happy Face

Campus Report ^ | December 14, 2007 | Emmanuel Opati

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Putin-A Happy Face

by: Emmanuel Opati, December 14, 2007

With the recent Russian economic boom, many Russians now see Putin as their Franklin D. Roosevelt, the 32nd U.S. President that served four terms.

President Vladimir Putin led his party, United Russia, to a 64% majority victory in the recent Duma elections.

It is believed Putin went all out to ensure victory and tailored the election to be a vote of confidence on his leadership. This meant a crackdown on the opposition by arresting and denying them media coverage. “Opposition parties were not able to get their message out, especially in the main outlet—the national television networks which work closely with the Kremlin,” said Masha Lipman of Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Angela Stent, Professor of Government at Georgetown University said “It was a referendum on President Putin and that referendum worked out for him.” Putin is constitutionally barred from seeking re-election in the March 2nd Presidential elections, but analysts see Putin’s active role in these elections as a strategy to position himself as a power figure with a lot of influence even after he leaves office.

There was criticism that Russian authorities used red-tape to make it difficult for election observers from The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), Office for democratic institutions and human rights to get visas and go to Russia for the elections.

However, election observers who were allowed in criticized the election as not being free and fair. “Some observers from the OSCE’s parliamentary assembly observed the elections as did people from the parliamentary assembly of the council of Europe and they have now said the elections were neither free nor fair and that there was meddling of state and the political party in the electoral process,” said Stent.

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“Opposition parties were not able to get their message out, especially in the main outlet—the national television networks which work closely with the Kremlin,”

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