Russian President holds his ballot at a polling station during the presidential election in Moscow on Sunday.
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Vladimir Putin is set to extend his power in Russian Federation for another six years after winning Sunday’s presidential election with a decisive 73.9% of the vote, a state-run exit poll shows.
Most of the voters AFP spoke to said they voted for Putin despite a litany of problems like poverty and poor healthcare, praising his foreign policies.
With more than half of ballots counted, he had received 75% of the vote, the central election commission said.
The exit poll showed Communist candidate Pavel Grudinin in second place with 11.2% of the vote, while ultranationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky came in third with 6.7%.
Presidential challenger Ksenia Sobchak, a 36-year-old TV host, urged Putin’s critics to “come together” and vote Sunday instead of boycotting.
Selfie competitions, giveaways, food festivals and children’s entertainers were laid on at polling booths in a bid to create a festive atmosphere around the election.
Overall national turnout was expected to be a little more than 60 percent, which would be several points below turnout in Putin’s electoral wins in 2000, 2004 and 2012. The diplomat added that Russian Federation, under the leadership of Putin, would maintain stability and keep developing and playing an even more significant role on the global arena. Because of the time zone different, voting began Saturday night in the Far East region.
He told a meeting of supporters afterwards that hard times were ahead, but that Russian Federation had a chance to make “a breakthrough”.
The Kremlin was relying on millions of budzhetniki: workers from state factories, army and schoolteachers who receive their salaries from the government.
In Moscow, first-time voters were being given free tickets for pop concerts, and health authorities were offering free cancer screenings at selected polling stations.
Interviewed on national television Yle, Soini said that the 70 per cent support for Putin and the voter turnout at around 60 per cent denote “a sort of stability” in Russian Federation, reports Xinhua. Also, Russian citizens will also be able to cast their ballots in 145 countries, including Israel.
“We also expect Russian Federation to make constructive contributions, more so than has been the case in the recent past”, he said. It said authorities had deterred the denial of service attack coming from 15 unidentified nations but gave few details of how serious it was.
Putin won his fourth presidential term Sunday with almost 77 percent of the vote – his strongest electoral support ever.
“People are put in a situation where they have no one to choose from”, he said.
Only Soviet dictator Josef Stalin ruled for longer.
Since first being elected president in 2000, Putin has stamped his total authority on the world’s biggest country, muzzling opposition, putting television under state control and reasserting Moscow’s standing overseas.
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He also questioned the fairness of the elections, saying “The result of the election in Russian Federation was as unsurprising to us as the circumstances of the election”.
