Press Release, 13.12.2018

During the signing ceremony of the Agreement “For Fair Elections”, which is annually organised by the Public Chamber of the Chelyabinsk Region for representatives of regional political parties, Yaroslav Shcherbakov, Chairman of the Chelyabinsk branch of Yabloko, proposed to supplement the agreement with a memorandum “For free and fair registration of candidates for the post of governor of the Chelyabinsk region”.

Shcherbakov noted that gubernatorial elections in the Chelyabinsk region in 2019 may lose any intrigue before the start, because only the pro-government’s United Russia party out of all the political forces in the region has enough votes of municipal deputies to overcome the candidate’s municipal filter [mandatory collection of signatures of municipal deputies in favour of registration of an independent candidate or a candidate from a non-parliamentary party in the race].

“Proceeding from these circumstances, it is impossible to speak about equal conditions for all participants in the electoral process. After all, a single order from the regional leadership of the United Russia party [to its municipal deputies who often constitute a majority in the municipal councils] can prohibit the deputies or heads of municipalities [from the United Russia party] from supporting one or another candidate,” Yaroslav Shcherbakov noted.

The Memorandum proposed by Yabloko aims to put an end to administrative and any other pressure on municipal deputies and heads of municipalities, which should guarantee their free will when expressing support for one or another candidate for Governor of the Chelyabinsk region when a candidate is trying to overcome the municipal filter.

The participants of the signing ceremony of the agreement “For Fair Elections” postponed consideration of the initiative of Yaroslav Shcherbakov, but promised to give him an answer. However, Yuri Karlikanov, representative of United Russia and deputy of the Legislative Assembly of the Chelyabinsk Region, openly stated that the ruling party did not need competitors for the upcoming gubernatorial elections, and all municipal deputies would support only one [their] candidate.

It should be noted that, taking into account the provisions of the present electoral legislation, any candidate who chose to run for election of Governor of the Chelyabinsk region needs to overcome the “municipal filter”. In the gubernatorial elections of 2014, candidates needed to collect 283 signatures from deputies elected in at least 33 municipal districts of the region, with 64 signatures to be from heads or district / city deputies.