2007 Russian legislative election

Legislative elections were held in the Russian Federation on December 2 2007. At stake were the 450 seats in the State Duma (Gosudarstvennaya Duma), the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia (the legislature).

Rules

The 2007 election were assigned exclusively from party-list proportional representation under a law adopted in 2005 on the initiative of President Vladimir Putin. He claimed it would strengthen the party system by reducing the number of parties in the Duma. In the previous elections half of the seats were filled using proportional representation and another half using the first-past-the-post system. It was also the first parliamentary election since 1993 that lacks the "against all" option on the ballot, and the first in which there was no provision for the minimum number of voters that must be achieved for the elections to be considered valid.

As of 2007, the 225 single-member districts were abolished. In the election of 2003, 100 of these seats were won by independents or minor party candidates. All seats were awarded by proportional representation. The threshold for eligibility to win seats was raised from 5.0 to 7.0 percent. In 2003 four parties each exceeded 7.0 percent of the list vote and collectively won 70.7 percent of the total Duma vote.

Only officially registered parties were eligible to compete, and registered parties could not form a bloc in order to improve their chances of clearing the 7.0 percent threshold, with the provision that parties in the Duma had to represent at least 60% of the participating citizens and that there must be at least two parties in the Duma. There were eleven parties eligible to take part in the Duma election. Duma seats were allocated to individuals on the lists of successful parties in accordance with their ranking there. Any members who resign from their party automatically forfeit their seats.

Several weeks ahead of the election, party leaders take part in moderated debates. Debates are televised on several state channels. Each candidate were given a chance to present his party's agenda, and to challenge opponents with questions. (United Russia refused to participate in the debates to receive more time for allowed promotion clips than other parties.)

In the Republic of Chechnya, a constitutional referendum was held on the same date.

Eligible parties

15 parties were eligible to participate in the elections. On 13 September 2007, Patriots of Russia and Party of Russia's Rebirth created a coalition, leaving only 14 parties to participate. All 14 parties have presented their lists of candidates to the Central Election commission. However, the Electoral Commission decided the Greens would not be able to stand, due to an alleged large number of faked signatures (17%, more than the allowed 5%) in their supporters' lists. The Peace and Unity Party and the People's Union were also denied participation in the elections. Included in final ballots:

1. Agrarian Party of Russia
2. Citizens' Force
3. Democratic Party of Russia
4. Communist Party of the Russian Federation
5. Union of Right Forces
6. Russian Social Justice Party
7. Liberal Democratic Party of Russia
8. Fair Russia
9. Patriots of Russia–Party of Russia's Rebirth Coalition
10. United Russia
11. Yabloko

Excluded from participation, after party registration:

1. Peace and Unity
2. Russian Ecological Party "Greens"
3. People's Union

Results

Preliminary results and exit-polls

As of 02:00, 3rd December Moscow Time about 47.14% votes have been counted. Four parties passed the 7% threshold: United Russia 63.2%, Communist Party of the Russian Federation 11.5%, Liberal Democratic Party of Russia 9.1%, Fair Russia 7.8%, Agrarian Party of Russia 2.5%, Russian Democratic Party Yabloko 1.5%, Union of Right Forces 1.1%, Civilian Power 1.0%, Patriots of Russia 0.9%, Russian Social Justice Party 0.2% and Democratic Party of Russia 0.1%.

This was consistent with exit polls conducted by VTsIOM, which predicted 61%, 11.5%, 8.8%, 8.4% respectively.

Official results

Results mostly repeated the ones of previous Russian legislative election, 2003. The ruling centrist party United Russia, leftist Communist Party and nationalist LDPR broke through 7% bareer again, moderately socialist Fair Russia took the place of Rodina, adsorbing many of its members and most of its electorate. United Russia kept its leading position, again receiving supermajority (more than 2/3 of seats). Which gives an opportunity to make changes to Constitution of Russia. According to the official results, in Chechnya voted 99,5% of all citizens and of them 99.36% voted for United Russia party (overall turnout in Russia was 62 percent and just over 64 percent of votes were cast for United Russia).

Pro-Kremlin parties

A number of parties contested the election. The biggest and most popular party in Russia is United Russia, which supports the policies of Vladimir Putin. On October 1 2007, Putin announced he would run first place on the United Russia list and that he might consider becoming Prime Minister after the elections. Other pro-Kremlin parties crossing the seven percent threshold include the new Fair Russia party led by Sergei Mironov, and the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, which has also been favourable towards President Putin's policies.

Opposition parties

The largest opposition party is the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, which saw its share of the vote cut in half between 1999 and 2003. It came in second with over 11% of the vote, however. The liberal democratic opposition was represented by the free-market Union of Right Forces, the more socially minded Yabloko, and Civilian Power representing right liberal ideology.

Election observers

The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) planned to send a large team of election monitors to Russia for the election, but scuttled the plans after experiencing problems securing visas. Russian officials denied the claim. Consequently, only 400 foreign monitors from international organisations were on hand to observe at some of Russia's 95,000 polling stations.

Criticism of the elections

Domestic criticism

Alexander Kynev, a political analyst with the monitoring organisation Golos, said they "have seen a campaign of unprecedented pressure on the voters." Golos said it has received more than 3,000 reports of election abuse on a special hotline.

The Communist Party said its 300,000 observers identified about 10,000 violations. It said it would ask the Supreme Court to rule on the validity of the vote. Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov called a news conference to criticize the results and said that Putin's party."has come up with 20 ways of humiliating the people".

Former world chess champion Garry Kasparov, who heads the Other Russia opposition movement, has dismissed the elections as a "farce" and "rigged from the start". Kasparov, who spent five days in jail previous week for holding an unauthorised march, said he plans to lay a wreath outside the Central Elections Commission to "mourn the death of Russian democracy".

Former Russian prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov also said the elections were illegitimate. "There is not doubt that these elections were not free. They were dishonest and unfair. The result is that this Parliament will not be legitimate," Kasyanov said.

The deputy head of Russia's elections commission, Nikolai Konkin, said "all complaints and allegations will be carefully examined" and pledged to respond in the coming days. Already on December 3, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov told CNN the complaints were "groundless".

Foreign criticism

European institutions

According to a joint statement by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and the Council of Europe, elections on December 2 "were not fair and failed to meet many OSCE and Council of Europe commitments and standards for democratic elections". According to the statement, "In general, the elections were well organised and observers noticed significant technical improvements. However, they took place in an atmosphere which seriously limited political competition and with frequent abuse of administrative resources, media coverage strongly in favour of the ruling party, and an election code whose cumulative effect hindered political pluralism. There was not a level political playing field in Russia in 2007."

As chief of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe mission Luc Van den Brande said at a news conference in Moscow the elections were not fair, although a number of positive moments were noted in preparations for the parliamentary elections. He said the president and his office had exerted an "overwhelming" influence on the campaign. He also criticized flaws in the secrecy of the vote.

Swedish parliamentarian Goran Lennmarker, who headed the OSCE team, said he was disappointed by the election process. Finnish parliamentarian Kimmo Kiljunen, the deputy president of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and a member of its election monitoring mission in Russia, questioned the accuracy of the reported Chechen election results, saying that it is "impossible that all voters come and vote for one and the same party."

According to Russian RIA Novosti news agency, "Igor Borisov of Russia's Central Election Commission said the OSCE and Council of Europe allegations were ungrounded and that the commission had not received any official reports from these organizations."

Foreign governments

Gordon Johndroe, United States National Security Council spokesman, said: "Early reports from Russia include allegations of election day violations. We urge Russian authorities to investigate these claims."

The European Union also voiced its concerns, with External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner stating that they "saw some violations of basic rights, notably free speech and assembly rights."

Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, in December 3 interview said that "she had noticed how difficult it had been for civil rights activists to be heard in Russia. I also regret that OSCE observers will not be able to take part in the elections there". German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said: "I deeply regret that there was no long-term OSCE election monitoring in Russia as was the case in previous years. (...) And indeed, as you heard this morning, accusations were made that the elections did not happen according to OSCE principles. I expect Russia to look into all these accusations."

The Czech Republic said the "election campaign did not conform to democratic standards."

Media

RFE/RL published a detailed report on election day why they considered the elections a show election.

According to British newspaper The Independent, "critics condemned the election as an exercise in phantom democracy. Although voters had a choice of 11 parties, the only ones with a chance of making it into Russia's notoriously feckless Duma are either creations of the Kremlin, or loyal to it."

See also

• Some video records of public TV debates between Russian parties (United Russia refused to take part in the debates)
• New electronic voting urns used in some election sites.