"Czar" Putin: absolute winner of the presidency

Moscow (AsiaNews) – After the vote count of 99.2%  the electoral commission has announced the victory of Vladimir Putin in the presidential elections. With the result many expected, Putin won a second term of 4 years, receiving 71.2 % of the counted ballots. The opponent with the most votes was communist Nikolai Kharitonov, with 13.7%.

The runner-up candidates positioned as follows: Sergei Glazyev, with 4.1%, liberal Irina Khakamada with 3.9%, Oleg Malyshin, representative of the national party of Vladimir Zhirinovsky received 2% of the preferred vote, and in last place was Sergei Mironov, at 0.8%.

The turn-out at the ballot-box was 64,3% of the electorate, substantially more than the 50% necessary to declare the elections valid.  About 3,5 percent of the ballots were invalid. 

With today's results, Putin is found to have a Soviet-style of governing, but with the democratic elections: his party has the 2/3 of the parliament; the media are supportive of him; his friends of the secret services are in key places. 

Kharitonov criticized the media for having given too space to Putin during the electoral campaign.  Also the American secretary of state, Colin Powell criticized "the manner in which the elections happened."  But according to many analysts, an autocratic state is what the Russians want.  "To govern this nation, one has to have much power ,"  said a retired person.  "Stalin wielded his power to kill millions of people, Putin does it in a democratic way".

• russia
• vladimir
• putin
• presidential
• elections