Press Release, 6.08.2024

Photo: Pavel Kharitonenko / Photo from social media

Yabloko candidate for Irkutsk City Duma, Pavel Kharitonenko, will seek his registration in the elections in court. Earlier, District Electoral Commission No. 28 invalidated eight signatures out of 67 provided by the Yabloko candidate in support of his nomination, with six acceptable defective signatures. The candidate is confident that five of the eight “invalid” signatures should have been accepted by the electoral commission. Kharitonenko’s lawsuit against the district electoral commission will be considered by the Sverdlovsk District Court of Irkutsk on 8 August. Kharitonenko is campaigning under the slogan “For Peace and Freedom”.

Pavel Kharitonenko is 3, he was born in Irkutsk, and has lived and worked in Irkutsk for almost his entire life, in the distrcit which is part of electoral district No. 28. Kharitonenko studied history at Irkutsk State University, then engaged in entrepreneurship, and worked in the restaurant business. Pavel Kharitonenko was fired from his last job after his interview with central Swiss television about how anti-war activists live in Russia after 24 February, 2022. Kharitonenko’s political activity began in 2019: the activist participated in protests against pension reform and the change of the Constitution, and spoke out against the current government and the president’s policies. He was repeatedly detained and subjected to administrative penalties. In 2024, the Irkutsk branch of Yabloko nominated Pavel Kharitonenko as a candidate for the Irkutsk City Duma elections.

To register for the elections, Kharitonenko collected 67 signatures, 61 of which should be considered valid. However, the working group of the electoral commission counted eight signatures as “invalid”, including so-called “unspecified corrections”, “marks on the sheet of unauthorised persons” (we are talking about the candidate himself) and names and surnames allegedly filled in by the collector, not the voters.

Pavel Kharitonenko is sure that only three signatures out of eight can be considered “invalid”, which means that the Yabloko candidate should be registered for the elections to the City Duma. Kharitonenko believes that the electoral commission actually refused not him personally, but those residents who expressed a desire to support the Yabloko candidate campaigning for peace and freedom.

“The question arises, why do we need such a law and such electoral commissions if, for bureaucratic reasons, they ignore the will of the voters, in whose interests they should work? Certainly, we are going to appeal the decision of the electoral commission in court; there is almost no hope for the court, but I am simply obliged to use every opportunity to protect my rights and the rights of voters who share my position,” Pavel Kharitonenko comments.