There is no official announcement yet. But in the end there isn’t that much need. Vladimir Putin is already running an election campaign that has little reason to exist. However, there is already a three-word slogan, which is also informal for now. “Pride. Hope. Trust”.
The re-nomination of the Russian president in the elections on March 18 is considered a given. Three days ago, “breaking news” emerged that revealed hot news: According to Kremlin sources, the man who has been at the helm of Russia for 23 years, including the years as head of government, has decided to present himself in a new way.
Dmitry Peskov, his spokesman, quickly denied this and said nothing had been clarified yet. There was never any doubt that this would be the case. Confirmation will come from the Tsar himself, who will drop it as a side note and speak almost of something else at a public meeting. Just like he did in 2018.
He also has his good reasons, because the next elections are purely a formality. Peskov himself, who in September this year described the administrative elections taking place across the country as “expensive bureaucracy,” only a week ago realized that “you might as well not vote.” Because Russia will still be a country at war in 2024 and because Putin is “the most loved in every family in the country.” There is some truth in each of these two statements.
But it is also true that real opposition figures are needed to prove the president’s popularity. A job that, as recent history shows, can be quite demanding. Two of Putin’s challengers who deny the “special military operation” in Ukraine will certainly be at the start, as they have already indicated. They both belong to the liberal galaxy, so they will steal votes from each other. They are Grigory Yavlinsky, the leader of Yabloko, the only opposition force that still has access to the life of the country, and Boris Nadezhdin, a former Duma deputy and former member of the dissolved Union of Right Forces.
If there is no announcement, there will be no real competition. On the other hand, there is a lot of speculation about the actual or alleged policies that the Kremlin has already set. According to these rumors, the Tsar’s goal is to achieve eighty percent of the vote, with turnout expected to be in the order of this figure.
Candidate Putin will present himself as an independent but will be supported by his personal party, United Russia, and by Fair Russia, a nominally center-left formation but expected to play a very limited role. A referendum like the one that must take place on March 18th does not require any extras. Call it democracy, if you will, very well-tempered.