What lessons can we draw from Russia's three-day presidential election? What consequences might it have for the continuation of the war in Ukraine? What does it say about Russian society? On Monday, March 18, readers asked Le Monde's Moscow correspondent Benoît Vitkine what this election means to Russia and the world.
It's not a question of believing it or not believing it: This is the result proclaimed by the Russian authorities. In this sense, at least in Russia, it's a fact.
Of course, we should obviously ask the question of how the score was arrived at. In my report last night, I recall the old and new methods – whether fraud or the use of "administrative resources" – which enable the desired score to be drawn more or less precisely.
But independent observers also have their instruments for (attempting to) decipher the results. In 2018, Putin was credited with attaining 76% of the vote. We found out after the fact (mainly by studying polling stations showing anomalous results) that while his victory was probably real, it was on a much smaller scale.
It takes time, and this work has been deliberately complicated by the authorities (detailed results are deliberately published in such a way as to be unusable and electronic voting is a complete black hole), but things will come out. Already, the first statistical anomalies are emerging, such as cities where all polling stations show similar turnout scores or results.
However, from what I see and hear in the country, I would say that support for Putin, while not necessarily enthusiastic, is very significant.
Once again, no one was waiting for this ballot to find out who would be elected, or the state of Russian opinion. This thermometer has been broken for a long time and no serious opponent, or one with an alternative discourse, was allowed. Elections in Russia are a ritual, a moment of self-celebration. This massive score is also a message sent to Russians and the rest of the world, an affirmation of solidity and determination.
It's obvious that these are not democratic elections, but we need a common language to understand each other. I don't mean to get into what-aboutism, but we didn't wait for Putin's Russia to realize that the word "elections" can cover different realities. Elections in France, back when only tax-payers could vote or when women did not have the right to vote, were still elections.
It's not an entirely satisfactory joke: The support of a significant part of the population is not contradictory with the fact that this population retains a very passive, even apathetic, relationship to politics. That's why I described it as support "without necessarily great enthusiasm."
On the other hand, my impression is that the war, especially since it has returned to Russian territory, is actually increasing this support. Many Russians are sticking their heads in the sand and waiting for it to pass, but many are also rallying behind the leader, or even mobilizing, which they would never have done before.
The war in Ukraine is worrying Russians, making them anxious. But Putin has managed to turn the conflict to his advantage so that the Russians give him credit for it: either among that minority who are enthusiastic about what they see as a "national renaissance," a source of pride, or because propaganda has succeeded in anchoring the idea that this war was inevitable, that their president is doing everything to defend them from external (Western) aggression.
The strength of Putin's rhetoric also lies in the fact that he continues to appeal to those who dream only of "stability," of their lives being unaffected and of this bad moment passing as quickly as possible. During his "campaign" (the term deserves even more quotation marks than "elections"), he continued to evoke a multitude of subjects, "national projects" to be launched in all fields, to the tune of billions. This had a strong whiff of a five-year plan, and money is running out, even for the priority war effort (tax hikes are expected very soon), but it reassures some that some form of normalcy can be maintained.
It's also impossible not to recall once again the media and repressive context. Russians have no access to alternative discourse, and those who try to express it are treated as enemies or traitors and punished.
Vladimir Putin has never taken part in an election debate in his life – and he didn't this time either.
There were debates between the other candidates, which aroused very moderate curiosity, and in which none claimed to covet Putin's post. To sum up the content, let's say that the candidate described as the most liberal, Vladislav Davankov, chosen to capture some of the votes of a democratic camp entirely deprived of political representation, spoke on subjects such as the workload in schools and the possibility of leaving Lenin's body in Red Square.
On the difficult subjects, and even if his program vaguely mentions "peace" in Ukraine or "negotiations," Davankov was the perfect loyal subject: He voted for the annexation of the regions taken from Ukraine and all the latest repressive laws.
There's a misunderstanding here. When I talk about observers, I'm not talking about international observers, who in any case are just a drop in the ocean, but about Russian observers. Russia has a strong tradition of election observation. In election after election, tens of thousands of Russians have been registered and trained in order to be allowed to observe all phases of the voting and counting process; they are a nuisance to those who organize local fraud.
But this role is what has been gradually disappearing since 2018. The major election observation organization Golos has been disbanded and repressed, and its president is in prison. Now, you have to be accredited by a party participating in the election or by an institution (civil chamber, etc.). Some observers of good faith still manage to slip through the cracks by registering with the Communist Party, for example; but as this party has no ambition to disrupt the electoral process or denounce fraud, this is difficult. Some observers were excluded from polling stations at the weekend, or arrested by the police. Their powers have also been curtailed.
There's also the question of video cameras in polling stations. Before, the footage was accessible to all citizens; today, viewing is only possible by regional electoral commissions.
Finally, as far as the international observers are concerned, whatever their origin (there were French observers among the lot), they are above all people selected for their complacency.
What he's been doing for the past two years, if not longer: continuing to put his country in marching order for a long war, waiting for either Ukraine's capitulation or the Western camp to collapse.
He believes that his country is already advancing in every respect, and that the people are behind him, despite the massive loss of life. This election will only reinforce this conviction. For him, the "heroism" of the soldiers and the "civic-mindedness" of the voters go hand in hand, showing a people devoted to their leader and to war. It's partly fantasy: When Russian TV reports that people emerging from the ruins of "liberated" Avdiivka were immediately asking about the possibility of voting in the presidential election, it's propaganda that's also designed for the leader, to confirm him in what he wants to hear.
In any case, there's no reason to expect the slightest inflection, the slightest change of course. There will only be minor changes: tax hikes, a cabinet reshuffle, increased repression, that kind of thing. And perhaps a new wave of mobilization, which is anything but minor.
I haven't the slightest idea, but that seems to me to give this election a great deal of importance... The only military significance I can imagine coming out of this electoral sequence is the question of mobilization that I've just mentioned.
And more generally, in the eyes of public opinion, the government is likely to be more open about putting the war at the heart of public discourse, whereas until now it has sought to maintain a form of balance with a promise of normality.
I don't have the turnout figures, but they were very high.
As for the results:
Luhansk: 94.12%
Donetsk: 95.23%
Kherson: 88.12%
Zaporizhzhia: 92.83%
Crimea: 93.6%
I said earlier how (little) credit could be given to the results. When it comes to these in particular, I'd call it nil.
For the moment, we have partial figures from the electoral commission and independent exit polls (they were banned in Russia), which show a clear trend: Whether in Western capitals or in other countries that have welcomed large contingents of Russians (Armenia, Turkey, Israel...), Vladislav Davankov, whom I mentioned earlier, is far ahead of Putin.
In terms of numbers, it's still incomparable, but it's impressive all the same: There's now a second Russia, living abroad. And one that feels under pressure and under threat from Moscow, by the way.
You're both right and wrong at the same time. Yes, there is a generation gap, in the relationship to freedoms, to loss, to nationalism, to the West, but we shouldn't overestimate it.
Polls show this, but so does my personal experience. To put it bluntly, I sometimes come across very young people, whose appearances, let's say, hint at a particular political stance, with blue hair and beautiful piercings. But not all of them are staunch opponents. Some adhere to the discourse of power, others maintain a distant indifference.
I may be wrong, but I don't think this is on the agenda. I've heard diplomats explain that foreign capitals don't have to "recognize" an election or not, but only the authorities of a country. It's not just a pirouette. One can denounce the undemocratic nature of an election (or the illegitimate nature of the vote, in the case of the territories annexed to Ukraine) while continuing to consider one's counterparts as legitimate, or at least legal, holders of power. The semantic evolution of Emmanuel Macron, who for some time now has been referring to the Russian "regime," is also noteworthy and it has been noticed in Moscow.
Then there's the element of realism. In Russia, there is no alternative leader such as Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who was widely believed to have won the 2020 election. Secondly, cutting off the channels of discussion with a power like Russia is probably not something Western leaders want to do.