7/20/19
Russian opposition leaders on Saturday led a protest in Moscow against the election commission’s decision to bar a host of candidates from the ballot for city council elections this fall that turned into the largest demonstration in Russia in recent years. Billed as the culmination of a week of daily protests that kicked off last Sunday, the demonstration — which was approved by the authorities — drew 22,500 people, according to White Counter, an NGO that tallies up participants who have passed through the security frames surrounding approved rallies. “I haven’t been at a protest this big since 2012,” opposition leader Alexei Navalny wrote on Twitter, referring to the Bolotnaya demonstrations that began in the winter of 2011 to protest Vladimir Putin’s return to the presidency. To run for the 45-seat Moscow City Duma, potential candidates each had to collect around 5,000 signatures from city residents. But lawmakers have seen some of the names they collected invalidated by the election commission, and all of the high-profile candidates have been barred from running. Opposition candidates, including Navalny allies Ilya Yashin, Lyubov Sobol and Ivan Zhdanov, this week appealed the decision to bar them from the ballot. Yashin, who saw about 20 percent of his signatures invalidated, would win in a landslide if allowed to ballot, a poll showed last month.
The protests over the past week were targeted mainly at Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin and election commission head Gorbunov. On Saturday, they turned against the man holding the country’s highest office. “It’s really a protest against Putin,” said Abbas Gallyamov, a former Kremlin speechwriter turned political analyst. “These elections have clearly become a way of expressing a much deeper frustration and demand for political representation.” “It’s a pre-revolutionary situation,” he added. “If these protesters don’t get political representation, they will try to overthrow the system.” If the planned gathering in front of City Hall does proceed next Saturday — a demonstration that almost certainly will not be approved by city officials — protesters and candidates alike can expect to be detained en masse. Just last month, police detained over 500 protesters during an unauthorized demonstration against police impunity after investigative journalist Ivan Golunov was arrested on what appeared to be fabricated drug charges. “When the authorities are scared they are aggressive,” Gallyamov said. “Right now they are clearly confused about what to do.”
