On March 17, alternative presidential elections for Russia as a part of the protest Noon Against Putin were held in Los Angeles, with Yulia Navalnaya, the wife of murdered Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, emerging as the victress.
Noon Against Putin (NAP) is a form of peaceful protest where voters who do not support Vladimir Putin come en masse to polling stations at noon and vote against Putin or spoil the ballot. Russians all over the world with democratic, anti-war, and pacifist views, despite current disagreements within the opposition, were eager to participate in the presidential elections on March 17, which were organized to favor the current leader of Russia, in order to express their strong will and show the real scale of the demand for change in Russia.
While presidential elections were underway in Russia in March, Russian Americans organized an alternative vote, eager to have a voice in the fate of their homeland, where Vladimir Putin, who completed his term as president for the first six years, once again was vying for the position of head of state.
According to the “Vote Abroad” project, which collects exit poll results outside of Russia, Putin was supported by only 15% of voters in the USA. This figure was announced by the organization that independently monitored the voting of the Russian president all over the world. Official voting results released by the Russian government looked more flattering for Putin: over 50% of the Russians in the US allegedly voted for him.
Official data in the Russian Federation was released a week after the elections in March, according to which the incumbent president received a record 87.28%. The current commander-in-chief has been governing the world’s largest country since 2000.
“I am against war and against the current President of the Russian Federation. I support Yulia Navalnaya,” said one of the participants of the peaceful protest in LA, referring to the wife of murdered Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Early in January 2024, Putin’s staunchest opponent, Alexei Navalny, who was killed by Putin’s regime in a Russian prison in February, called on Russians to take part in a peaceful protest Noon Against Putin, demonstrating this way to the whole world their strong reluctance not to see the current Russian President in power for the next 6 years.
On voting day, March 17, anti-Putin rallies took place in Russia, around the world, and, of course, in the USA. Most of the dissenters were recorded in Russia, where people formed long lines in front of polling stations to express their protest by spoiling the ballot or voting for any other candidate but Putin.
At the same time, in Russia, one could notice some people who perceived the elections as part of the Maslenitsa folk holiday and came to polling stations in costumes from folk tales. Outside the country, voters demonstrated more mature behavior: they shouted slogans for which they would receive longer prison sentences back home than for killing a person.
Putin vowed to continue the war with Ukraine despite international sanctions and a continuous outflow of the population. More than a million Russian men left Russia due to the outbreak of a full-scale war in Ukraine, but some of them returned to their motherland.
Many Russians of Greater Los Angeles with democratic and anti-war views, despite disagreements within the opposition, decided to participate in alternative fair elections in order to express their will and show the real scale of the demand for change in Russia, as the official ones from the very beginning were organized to favor the current leader of Russia. As a result, they determined the leader of the independent vote: Yulia Navalnaya emerged victorious. The wife of the Russian opposition leader took on the burden of being the voice of free compatriots after her husband’s death in January 2024.
On Monday, March 18, 2024, right after the elections, the Russian Central Election Commission (CEC) summed up the preliminary results of the presidential elections in the Russian Federation. The number of votes cast for Vladimir Putin across the country was almost 90%, and in some regions of Russia, it even exceeded this mark. CEC workers proudly announced an unprecedented turnout across the country and beyond its borders.
The inauguration of the “new old” president will take place on May 7, 2024.
Vitaly Ataev Troshin, SlavicSac.com
California Local News Fellowship
