The Russians voted on Sunday on the final day of legislative and local elections, in which the movement of the opponent Alexeï Navalny was dismissed and his voting instructions blocked by digital giants under pressure from the authorities.
The poll is set to be won by the ruling United Russia party – despite its unpopularity – after months of repression that have severely weakened critics of President Vladimir Putin.
Anti-corruption activist and main opponent of the Kremlin, Alexei Navalny, 45, was jailed in January for a fraud case he considers political. Its organizations were banned for “extremism” before the poll and many of its executives fled the country for fear of prosecution.
The vote held over three days, from Friday to Sunday, aims to renew the 450 terms of deputies of the Duma, the lower house of Parliament currently dominated by United Russia. Local and regional elections also take place.
“Imitation of elections”
“It’s an imitation of elections and it’s sad,” said Andrei, a 33-year-old computer scientist voting Sunday in Moscow. Interviewed by AFP, he says he followed the instructions of Mr. Navalny’s team but refuses to give his name for fear of reprisals.
As almost no anti-Putin candidate has been allowed to run, Navalny’s supporters have devised a so-called “smart vote” strategy designed to support those – often Communist – candidates best placed to hinder that of the party. to be able to.
The opponent, imprisoned a hundred kilometers from Moscow, once again called on Sunday to vote to follow these instructions. “Your voice really matters,” he wrote in a social media post on Sunday.
“Vote and persuade others to vote. Please don’t be lazy. “
The Russian authorities, however, exerted unprecedented pressure against digital companies disseminating these recommendations and succeeded in bending Google and Apple.
The two giants agreed on Friday to remove the “smart vote” mobile application from their store, supporters of Alexei Navalny immediately recognizing a “huge victory” for the Kremlin and accusing the two American firms of “giving in to blackmail”.
Google has also suspended access to two lists containing these guidelines and posted on Google Docs, its word processing service, and two videos posted on Youtube – which Google owns.
Mr Navalny’s team responded by giving instructions on Twitter to download a virtual private network (VPN) to avoid blockages.
According to close sources interviewed by AFP, Google and Apple obeyed the Russian authorities for fear of arrests of their employees in Russia.
Telegram messaging, very popular in Russia, has also removed these voting instructions on its platform.
Over 3,600 potential frauds
Some 108 million Russians are being called to the polls until 8 p.m. local Sunday across the country’s eleven time zones, with the first estimates expected by late evening.
At 07:00 GMT Sunday, turnout in the legislative elections reached 35.69% according to the Electoral Commission. The head of the latter, Ella Pamfilova, reported Sunday “eight cases of ballot box stuffing” across the country.
But according to a list from the specialized NGO Golos, more than 3,600 possible irregularities have been reported since the start of the vote, including ballot stuffing and pressure to vote.
Kirill Sergeiénko, a 43-year-old voter, told AFP that he had come to vote specially on Sunday in St. Petersburg, hoping that there would be “less possibility of fraud” on the last day of the polls.
Most of the opposition having been banned, United Russia should win, for lack of real competition and despite a popularity rating of less than 30%, according to the state polling center VTsIOM.
The other parties represented in the Duma – communists, nationalists and centrists – are on the whole in line with President Putin, who remains popular.
“We simply believe in him,” Anna Kartachova, 50, a pharmaceutical company employee who came to vote in Moscow told AFP on Sunday. She says she gave her vote to the president’s party because she says “sees no one else on the horizon” apart from Mr. Putin.
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