Five minutes earlier, there was nothing but the dreary routine of a sparsely-frequented polling station in central Moscow. A few voters taking turns at irregular intervals in front of the assessors' desks, under tight police surveillance.
Suddenly, with just a turn of the head, a queue formed. Ten meters, then 20, then 30, until it spilled out of the courtyard of school number 1500, onto the sidewalk of Prosvirine Street. A crowd of voters, the likes of which has not been seen since the start of the Russian presidential election, held from March 15 to 17.
The first in line are a little intimidated, still unsure of their boldness. "You can vote whenever you like, it's still a right in this country," joked a middle-aged woman, who finally conceded. "Of course I came especially at noon! In a democracy, it's in the ballot box that you protest. Here, you make do as you can..."
This gathering of voters at a fixed time on the last day of voting is the only grain of sand that Vladimir Putin's opponents have managed to introduce into the relentless electoral machine that will enable the Russian president to remain in power for six more years, against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine and increased repression.
The idea was first put forth by Maxime Reznik, an old liberal activist from Saint Petersburg now in exile, before being supported by all democratic opponents, whether in Russia, in exile or in prison: to vote all together. This was as much an act of defiance against those in power as an act of coming together, of warming up to the presence of one's neighbor. The name of the initiative was "Noon against Putin". A type of large demonstration, necessarily legal, scattered across as many polling stations as there are in Russia.
"Even if I'm denied the right to do so, I have a political position and I want to make it known," said a young man in a Moscow queue, who, like the other interviewees, asked to speak anonymously. "We're reassuring ourselves that we're not alone, and maybe we can also reassure the outside world: no, this country isn't entirely subject to a cannibalistic madman."
A little further on, a young woman added: "We have nothing else to legally express ourselves. Even the candidates who were cautiously critical of Putin and the war were dismissed." Her sister, who accompanied her, added: "Voting on the last day makes the fraudsters' job harder. My vote may be drowned in the falsifications of electronic voting, but at least it will be counted. If I'd come on Friday, I'd have had no way of knowing what happened to my ballot over the next three days."
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