Decision of the Bureau of the Novosibirsk Regional Branch of Yabloko

Statement by the Novosibirsk Regional Branch of the Yabloko party, 5.09.2023

Photo: Novosibirsk / Photo by Alexander Polezhaev, Wikimedia Commons

The Novosibirsk branch of Yabloko considers the election of the governor of the region in the current Russian situation unfree and unfair. There has been set a surrogate task to imitate democratic procedures, create the illusion of a legitimate change of power. The very essence of the election lost its meaning with a complex and developed electoral system.

For almost a quarter of a century, the country has come to a situation of elections without a choice, and the higher is the level of the vertical, the more reliably the approaches to it are blocked. The state machine prepares public opinion about the need to support the head of the region long before the voting day: his complete dependence on the federal power vertical is presented as an uncontested good. At the legislative level, a municipal filter [a mandatory collection of signatures from municipal deputies, who are mostly pro-government, in favour of nomination of a candidate] was introduced as a way to screen out non-pro-government candidates, as well as refusing self-nominated candidates to run for governor. Thus, all possibilities not only to become the head of the region, but also to use the election campaign to interact with voters have been eliminated. In these elections, the authorities reduce their credibility by using a system of remote electronic voting, which has already managed to discredit itself in Russian conditions.

In such a situation, the opposition Yabloko party has no chance to nominate its candidates for governor. In 2023, the voice for peace and freedom does not suit our government, and it has taken measures to ensure that this voice does not sound at all, if possible.

In this regard, the Bureau of the Novosibirsk regional branch of the Yabloko party states the following:

1. We are confident that the election of the Governor of the Novosibirsk Region in 2023 will bring to the residents neither protection of rights and freedoms, nor security, nor development.

2. We are against imitation procedures that make up the elections of the heads of Russian regions today, and we insist on a fundamental change in the federal and regional electoral legislation in accordance with the norms of a democratic state.

3. The Novosibirsk branch of Yabloko cannot support any of the candidates registered [for the gubernatorial election] in the Novosibirsk region, since the political forces that nominated them, in fact, oppose the development of a democratic society. We say to voters who support democratic and humanistic values: you can only vote for those whose beliefs you share.

4. At the absence of a possibility to vote “against all”, Russian law does not prohibit a voter from invalidating a ballot.