The elections were accompanied by massive early voting, vote-buying and low turnout

Press Release, 23.11.2020

Vladislav Postnikov, Yabloko’s candidate in the by-election to the City Duma of Yekaterinburg in single-mandate constituency No. 3, came second  (20.8% versus 28% for the United Russia candidate). Potnikov won among voters who voted on the election day. Dmitry Trynov, candidate for constituency No.9 came third, receiving 14.5% of the votes.

Activists of the Sverdlovsk branch of Yabloko note that the elections were held in the conditions of massive early voting, buying up of votes for candidates from the parties in power, with a record low turnout of just over 10%.

“My congratulations to the Sverdlovsk branch of Yabloko and the whole party with good results in the by-elections to the Yekaterinburg City Duma.

This is another blow to the persistent myth that Russian regions do not vote for Yabloko and that we supposedly do not know how to conduct election campaigns,” Yabloko Chairman Nikolai Rybakov said.

The party leader also thanked the Chairman of the regional branch of the party Sergei Khorenzhenko, members of the Yabloko Federal Bureau Maxim Petlin, Alexander Yefimov, Olga Kolokolova for their active participation in the election campaign, as well as all volunteers and members of the candidates’ headquarters.

Member of the Yabloko Bureau Maxim Petlin noted that another important result of the campaign was that law enforcement agencies, with the help of volunteers and observers, managed to detain and register several teams of buyers of votes.

“They have been buying votes almost always, but very quietly and discreetly, during this campaign it was done impudently and cynically, and they we rebuying votes both for the United Russia Party and the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, however, on election day two teams [of buyers] were detained, we will follow the investigation and demand that not only those who performed this, but also the organisers are brought to criminal liability,” said Maxim Petlin said.

It should be noted that Dmitry Trynov, Chairman of the University Solidarity trade union in the Urals Federal University, and Vladislav Postnikov, head of the Sverdlovsk branch of the public organisation Open Russia, won the general democratic primaries, after which the conference of the Sverdlovsk regional branch of Yabloko supported their candidacies. The candidates share the values ​​of Yabloko, spelled out in the Memorandum of Political Alternative.

By-elections to the Yekaterinburg City Duma in district No. 9 and district No. 3 were held on 22 November.