Olga Pokrovskaya indicated in her dissenting opinion, that the elections were held with numerous violations of the law.

Press Release, 17.09.2019

Olga Pokrovskaya, member of the St. Petersburg Electoral Commission with a casting vote from Yabloko, expressed her dissenting opinion, noting that she disagreed with the decision of the St. Petersburg Electoral Commission to approve the results of the St. Petersburg gubernatorial elections.

According to Olga Pokrovskaya, serious violations were committed even at the stage of nominating candidates for governor: the principle of equality was not respected during collection of signatures of both voters and municipal deputies for registration of candidates for elections [which is a requirement of the law] – some candidates tried to collect signatures, but other employed the administrative resource [when the required signatures were brought to them]. As a result, even representatives of some parties with factions in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg were not able to take part in the elections.

In addition, Pokrovskaya also emphasised that observers and the media had documented a significant number of violations of the voting procedure and the establishment of its results. In particular, some precinct electoral commissions denied access to documents and voter lists to the commission members, there were numerous stuffings and attempts of stuffings of fraudulent bulletins into ballot boxes, repeated attempts to bribe voters, and in a number of districts demonstrated an abnormally high home voting.

There was also interference with the work of observers, and some precinct electoral commissions refused to issue certified copies of the protocols. All this happened at connivance of law enforcement agencies.

“Such a style of holding elections has nothing to do with law, it destroys the credibility of both the institution of election and the state organising such elections,” Olga Pokrovskaya emphasised.

“Given the above, I cannot be certain that the results of the election of Governor of St. Petersburg as determined by the St. Petersburg Electoral Commission are based on reliable data of the results of the voting. This does not allow me to vote for the decision of 11. 09.2019,” runs the dissenting opinion of a member of the St. Petersburg City Electoral Commission from Yabloko.

It should be noted that Boris Vishnevsky, head of the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, was not allowed to run in the election of the governor of St. Petersburg due to the use the prohibitive “municipal filter” requiring him to collect signatures in his favour from municipal deputies most of whom belonged to United Russia.

Yabloko’s Federal Political Committee considers the gubernatorial elections in St. Petersburg to be pseudo-elections, does not recognise their results, as well as the governor elected though such election as the legitimate head of the city.