Press Release, 24.08.2021

Photo: Mikhail Korelin / Photo from Mikhail Korelin’s personal Facebook page

A competitor from the LDPR parliamentary pro-government party is trying to remove Yabloko candidate Mikhail Korelin from the elections to the Legislative Assembly of the Sverdlovsk region in the Alapaevsky single-mandate constituency.

LDPR’s Alexander Boltenkov appealed to the Sverdlovsk Regional Court with a claim that Korelin had not provided information about his minor daughter when applying for registration in the elections.

Candidates had to submit information about their spouses, minor children and property as of 1 June, 2021. However, the very filing of documents took place after this date – at the beginning of July. Korelin’s daughter became an adult on 9 June, so he did not provide information about her. The district electoral commission did not consider this a violation and registered Korelin as a candidate. A similar decision was made by the regional electoral commission, since Korelin is also running for the Legislative Assembly as a candidate on the Yabloko party list.

“The real reason for the attempt to remove the Yabloko candidate from the elections by the hands of the LDPR party is that the regional authorities are afraid of failing the elections in this constituency,” Maxim Petlin, a member of the Yabloko Federal Bureau and Chairman of the regional branch of Yabloko in the Sverdlovsk region, says. “Mikhail is an active member of the Duma of the Artyomovsk urban district, and is a well-known and respected coach and athlete. He has a real chance of defeating the candidate from the ruling party,” Maxim Petlin notes.

Elections to the Legislative Assembly of the Sverdlovsk Region will be held on 19 September. Yabloko’s candidates list in these elections is topped by Konstantin Kiselyov,  a deputy of the Yekaterinburg City Duma. The party nominated 25 candidates to run in single-mandate constituencies.