Not Turning Out Together
Boris Kagarlitsky
The Moscow Times, 18 March 2004
No self-respecting political pundit can get by without offering his take on Sunday's presidential election. The Western press sent special correspondents to Moscow for the big event. But finding nothing remotely resembling a political contest, the foreign press corps was at a loss, while their more cynical Russian colleagues wondered why anyone would want to write about the election at all.
A Xeroxed notice was taped to the door of the political department of the opposition newspaper Novaya Gazeta: "I couldn't care less about this election". The mood in the newsroom was almost festive. "For the first time, the entire department is acting as one", a young journalist joyously informed me. "We're not going to vote en masse!" Now this was a new and very Russian idea - not doing something all together.
An old family friend threw a birthday party at her dacha on election day. Her son's birthday was actually on Friday, but she postponed the party until the weekend - a time-honored Soviet tradition. The regime summoned us to vote, and we responded by driving out to our friend's dacha and having a wonderful time. I informally polled the assembled partygoers and found that none had any intention of voting. Total solidarity.
On election weekend, the Institute of Globalization Studies organized a seminar in the Moscow region for activists from leftist youth groups. Communist Party youth leaders attended, although their party was ostensibly contesting the election. That didn't concern these young people. "What's the point of taking part in a farce?" they asked. Their only concern was "raising voter non-participation" - another new concept.
I declined invitations from various radio stations to come to the studio and analyze the election results on air, saying that I was leaving Moscow on important business - a conference in Istanbul.
In Istanbul, I was sitting with friends and drinking tea at a marvelous tearoom right down on the Bosporus. For the sake of appearances I called my wife to find out what was happening in Moscow. "The Manezh is on fire", she reported.
Unfortunately, my Turkish colleagues also asked me to analyze the election results. There was no getting away from it: So here's my take on the election.
There were three winners. No one doubted that Vladimir Putin would win a second term, but Nikolai Kharitonov also has reason to celebrate. As the candidate from the totally demoralized Communist Party, with almost no access to the media, he managed to perform no worse than the party itself had in December's State Duma elections. The Communists also came out on top in their battle with the renegade Sergei Glazyev, although his poor showing owed less to the Communists' efforts than to divisions within Rodina and the Kremlin's campaign to deflate an ambitious and unreliable politician.
Taken together, opposition politicians pulled in enough votes to ensure that the legal minimum for voter turnout - 50 percent of registered voters - was reached. Had Kharitonov and Irina Khakamada pulled out of the race and joined the boycott, Putin's support alone would not have been enough to clear the 50 percent barrier. But they merely paid lip service to the impossibility of participating in "this sort" of election. Once more the Communist opposition rescued a regime it lambastes as the enemy of the people.
I doubt the presidential administration will truly appreciate the Communists' support. In fact, the opposite is more likely: Figuring that Glazyev is no longer a threat and vexed by Kharitonov's strong showing, the Kremlin's political pit bulls will probably go after the Communists.
I promised to name a third victor. His name is "Comrade Boycott".
It was always going to be impossible to keep voter turnout low enough to invalidate the election. Even if no one had turned out to vote, the Central Elections Commission would have figured something out. The good folks at the CEC know a thing or two about creative counting.
Nevertheless the voter boycott scored a victory, the same sort of "moral victory" that losers always talk about. We who chose not to vote did not allow ourselves to become the moral hostages of the regime. We didn't play the Kremlin's game. For the first time, the millions of Russians who didn't vote sensed that they were part of a united whole.
We acted no differently than before. But in the past we acted alone. On March 14, 2004, a very important event occurred in the lives of millions of Russian citizens: Together, we didn't vote.
Copyright 2004 The Moscow Times
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