71-year-old Vladimir Putin has declared himself the victor of Russia's 2024 presidential election.
Record results in a record turnout
There are 112.3 million eligible voters inside Russia and Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine, according to Russia’s Central Election Commission (CEC), and 1.9 million eligible voters who live abroad.
Polls opened for a three-day period starting from Mar. 15, 2024. Polls opened earlier in some Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine to encourage residents to vote.
Some residents in Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine reported seeing pro-Russian individuals accompanied by armed soldiers going from home to home with ballot boxes.
The Washington Post reported that Russia’s presidential administration is determined to see a turnout of at least 70 per cent.
Local governors and state enterprise owners were tasked to ensure high participation while public sector employees were apparently pressured to vote.
The 2024 turnout surpassed the 67.5 per cent recorded in 2018 levels, and was the highest since Putin came into power in the 2000 presidential elections.
74.22 per cent of the nation's voters cast their ballots before polls closed at 6pm in Russia on Mar. 17 (2am in Singapore on Mar. 18).
Early results showed Putin dominating over his opponents by a landslide.
With more than half the ballots counted, Russia’s CEC reported that Putin secured around 87.3 per cent of the vote, surpassing his previous record of 76.7 per cent in 2018.
Other polls suggest a similar figure, albeit with varying percentage points, which is the highest ever result in Russia’s post-Soviet history.
Golos, an independent election watchdog, was declared a foreign agent and barred from observing the vote.
Golos' co-chairman said the 2024 elections are the "most closed, most secret elections in Russian history" since the break-up of the Soviet Union 33 years ago.
No real challengers
BBC reported that the Kremlin has removed any possible challenger from Russia's political landscape, adding that Putin's opponents have either been jailed, or have fled into exile, or have lost their lives.
Two other potential candidates, Boris Nadezhdin and Sergey Malinkovich, were barred from the elections due to alleged irregularities in the signatures of voters supporting his candidacy.
Nadezhdin, who is against the war in Ukraine, was said to be the last significant challenger to Putin after Alexei Navalny died on Feb. 16.
Navalny, who was Russia's most prominent opposition politician and a frequent critic of Putin, was serving a 19-year sentence in the Polar Wolf, a Russian penal colony in the Arctic, when he "became unwell after a walk" and "almost immediately lost consciousness".
Putin's quasi-opponents in the 2024 presidential election — Nikolai Kharitonov of the Communist Party, Vladislav Davankov of the New People Party and Leonid Slutsky of the Liberal Democratic Party — were all rubber-stamped by the Kremlin.
Kharitonov, who came in at a distant second to Putin in 2004, praised Putin ahead of the 2024 election for "trying to consolidate the nation for victory in all areas".
Davankov's party has been described by a Russian journalist as a "fake party" planted by the Kremlin.
Slutsky, after registering his candidacy in December 2023, told reporters "I don’t dream of beating Putin. What’s the point?" before predicting "a huge victory" for Putin.
Kharitonov, Davankov and Slutsky came in at second, third and fourth place respectively, early results showed. Each of the three men won more than two but no more than five per cent of the vote.
Noon against Putin
The 2024 Russia presidential election saw scattered incidents of protests, such as setting fire to voting booths, pouring green dye into ballot boxes and spoiling ballots.
Protests peaked on the third day of the election, Mar. 17, when thousands of voters, including Nalvalny's widow, Yulia Navalnaya, registered their discontent by turning up at polls specifically at noon as part of Navalny's "midday/noon against Putin" protest.
Navalny had came up with "midday/noon against Putin" shortly before his death.
Navalnaya called on Navalny supporters to honour his death by participating in the protests, and for Russians to spoil their ballot or vote for "any candidate except Putin".
Showing up at Russia's embassy in Berlin at noon on Mar. 17, Navalnaya waited for hours to write Navalny's name on her ballot paper.
At least 80 people across Russia were arrested that day, according to OVD-Info, a group that monitors crackdowns on dissent.
Victory lap
Putin, in his victory speech hours after polls closed on Mar. 17, said protests had no impact on the election outcome and condemned those who spoilt their ballots, saying they would "have to be dealt with".
He said: "No matter who or how much they want to intimidate us, no matter who or how much they want to suppress us, our will, our consciousness — no one has ever succeeded in anything like this in history."
"They have not succeeded now, and they will not succeed ever in the future."
Putin also publicly referred to Navalny by his name for the first time since his death, and in public, saying that Navalny's death was a "sad event" and "unfortunate incident".
He also confirmed that a prisoner swap was planned, where he had agreed for Navalny to be exchanged "for some people held in correctional facilities in Western countries".
The New York Times reported that Navalny would have been swapped for Vadim Krasikov, who is currently jailed in Germany for killing a former Chechen separatist fighter in Berlin in 2019.
"Just with one condition: 'We'll trade him but make sure that he doesn't come back, let him stay over there.'" Putin said. "But this happens. That’s life."
When asked if the 2024 election, and his reelection, was democratic, Putin used it as an opportunity to take shots at democracy in the United States (U.S.).
He said Russia's use of online voting, which had brought in 8 million voters, was more advanced than the U.S..
"It's transparent and absolutely objective, not like in the U.S. with mail-in voting... you can buy a vote for US$10," Putin claimed.
However, Russia's online voting system has been widely criticised as opaque, as there is no way to verify votes.
The U.S., as well as the United Kingdom, has denounced the 2024 election and said its neither free nor fair.
What another term of Putin means
The results mean Putin will retain his reign over Russia for the next six years until 2030, when he will be 77.
By then, he would have completed his fifth term and served three decades as Russia's leader, overtaking Josef Stalin, who ruled the Soviet Union for 29 years, to become the country's longest-serving leader since the 1700s.
Putin said in his next term he would prioritise tasks related to Russia's "special military operation" in Ukraine, or what he calls Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and strengthen the Russian military.
He added that his win will "consolidate" Russian society.
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Top image from The Guardian/YouTube