PrintMarch 2, 2008
As expected, Medvedev is cruising to victory in Russia
File this one under "Least surprising electoral result in history."
Russia blog, which has been liveblogging the Russian presidential election shows that Vladmir Putin's close ally and ventriloquist dummy Dmitry Medvedev is cruising to an easy win:
All the polling stations are closed now, and the voting is done.There have been the usual mountain of reports indicating fraud but since Putin prevented the presence of international observers in any great numbers, it will be impossible to prove.
All that remains is to count the votes. Earlyy figures released by the CEC are pretty much following the polls at the moment. As of now, they’re reporting an easy win for Medvedev (translation here) - as we stand the candidates rank as follows:
64.55% - Dmitry Medvedev
18.85% - Gennady Zyuganov
12.71% - Vladimir Zhirinovsky
1.49% - Andrei Bogdanov
No official turnout yet, but I saw an earlier report (sorry, lost the link) which put it at just under 64%, which I’d imagine will be a (very very) slight disappointment to the Kremlin.
In Chechnya, Medvedev gained a disappointing 90% of the vote (translation here). Disappointing because Putin gained 99% there just four years ago…
Watch now how Putin will be speaking throught Medvedev without even moving his lips - a great performance by a master.
