This content was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission.
After last weekend’s elections that had” no meaning,” Yulia Navalnaya, the wife of Russian opposition legislator Aleksei Navalny, has urged the international community to reject President Vladimir Putin as a “legitimate” leader of the nation.
In a video message posted on social media on March 19 by her supporters, Navalnaya urged them to” not give up” in supporting Putin, who had no choice but to run against her. With more than 87 percent of the votes cast, the candidate easily won with no opposition, with no potential rival candidate in the absence of any potential challengers already in jail or barred from running.
” The result of this election has no meaning. Putin wants to appoint a leader with whom he appears to have a lot of help, Navalnaya said.
” These votes are over but nothing is finished. On the contrary, we may gather our power and work harder than ever before”, she added.
In a firmly controlled March 15 to March 17 election that the West has criticized as neither free nor good, Putin sought to demonstrate frustrating popular support for his full-scale invasion of Ukraine and his increasingly repressive laws by winning a landslide success.
By the end of his new name, the 71-year-old Putin will surpass Communist despot Josef Stalin’s almost 30-year rule to become the longest-serving Russian president in more than two decades. He has been in office as president or prime minister since 2000.
For the first time in post-Soviet past, independent election observers were prohibited from participating in this year’s presidential election, according to experts. Elections in Russia have been famous for poll stuffing and various irregularities.
Navalnaya praised those Russians who took part in the Noon Against Putin demonstration on March 17 that was organized by Navalny’s partners all over Russia and in other nations in the picture.
You are the ones who will win the election that the Kremlin casts as a result. There were so many of you — courageous, free, and good individuals all around Russia, who came at Noon Against Putin to the polling stations. I am appreciative of each and every one of you,” Navalnaya said.
Putin wants to appear as though he has a lot of help. But you, those who came to the polling stations at 12 p. m., are more persuasive than any false percentages ]of support for Putin ]”, Navalnaya emphasized, adding that although the election is over, “nothing has ended” regarding” the fight against the regime”.
We demonstrated that Putin is not our president, according to Navalnaya, adding that we will work to ensure that no one in the world recognizes him as a legitimate leader and that those who are with him sit at the table discuss how to combat Putin’s mafia in a similar manner to those who are trying to persuade an organized criminal organization to make them aware that Putin is no Russia.
Navalnaya, who is now living outside of Russia, vowed to continue her soon father’s fight for” a great Russia of the future” after the outspoken Kremlin writer died on February 16 in one of Russia’s most famous prison in the Arctic.
Navalnaya and her father’s partners, along with several European governments, have blamed Putin for the Kremlin author’s demise, which occurred under strange circumstances while he was serving time in prison for what are commonly believed to be trumped up costs.
