Electoral Passions

On Sunday, December 4, elections were held for the Moscow City Duma, alongside by-elections for the State Duma in two Moscow districts. Given the current state of Russian politics, the outcome was a foregone conclusion, but that did not rein in anyone’s political passions.

The main intrigue of the Moscow Duma elections revolved around the party Rodina (Motherland). The conservative party ran a commercial leading up to the election in which several dark-skinned, dark-haired men were eating watermelon and throwing their peels on the pavement, ignoring the requests of some Rodina activists to stop littering. “Do you understand Russian?” a Rodina-ite asks. This was followed by the none-too-subtle tagline: “Let’s clean our city of dirt.” The clip evoked several protests (the Azerbaijani ambassador expressed his concern) and was swiftly banned. But Rodina did not retreat, and ran the ad in French (thus hinting that the riots in France could repeat in Russia). Now it was the French ambassador’s turn to  protest. The ultra-conservative LDPR filed a complaint in court.

Meanwhile, the LDPR produced their own TV commercial, one even more blatantly racist, but it was never aired. Reportedly it contained the tagline: “For a city with Russian faces.” Rodina decided to make its own court claim – not for plagiarism, as one might perhaps expect – but “for fermenting national discord.” The upshot of the various actions was that the Moscow City Court barred Rodina from the Moscow City Duma elections; the decision was upheld by the Russian Supreme Court in a ruling two days before the election. Rodina’s claim against the LDPR was rejected.

As it was, LDPR did not poll more than 10% of votes in the election, disqualifying it from representation in the Moscow Duma. According to Interfax, only three election alliances will be represented in the capital’s Duma: United Russia (the pro-Kremlin bloc) received 47.37% of the vote, the Communist Party polled 16.7% and the liberal Yabloko-United Democrats received 11.01%.

In Moscow’s by-elections for the Russian Duma, Vladimir Kvachkov, who is in prison awaiting trial on charges of attempting to assassinate UES CEO Anatoly Chubais, ran for the open seat in Preobrazhensky district. He collected 29% of the votes, losing to United Russia candidate Sergei Shavrin, who got 36%. Interestingly, Kvachkov, an ex-colonel in the Special Forces, received every third vote in the district, yet he is only known to the public because of his alleged involvement in Chubais’ murder attempt.

In the Universitetsky district, writer Victor Shenderovich, who stepped in to run when Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s candidacy was barred, lost to film director Stanislav Govorukhin. Govorukhin ran as a United Russia candidate and received some interesting “indirect” State support: his films were broadcast in curiously high concentrations, and huge billboards advertising his latest movie popped up all around the capital. Govorukhin collected 38% percent of votes to Shenderovich’s 16%.