Vorstand reshuffle. Putin was inaugurated on Monday and, as promised, immediately nominated Medvedev as PM. He was confirmedby the Duma the next day (Communists and Just Russia voting against). I was intrigued by their first reported actions: Putin ordered the creation of a business ombudsman to defend “the rights of entrepreneurs” showing that improvement of Russia’s business climate is a high priority. Medvedev called for a new system of state defence orders. This last has been notoriously opaque; many complain the money is not wisely spent and Russian-made weapons are over priced and not modern. Note that each of these touches on corruption: there are those who think that Putin returned to the Presidency because only he has the political muscle to attack this pervasive problem. Perhaps so, we will see. I still think that we need to see someone in an office close to the two led away in handcuffs for an anti-corruption drive to really bite.

Demonstrations. The opposition movement is losing steam. As we have seen before in post-Soviet Russia, it is one thing to agree on dislike of the present regime but quite another to agree on what comes next. An association of former ins wanting to get back in, communists, nationalists and “new young people” do not have very much in common. The two pre-eminent leaders (or actors: are there any “leaders”?) now appear to be the hard left Sergey Udaltsov and the anti-corruption (and rather nationalistic) Aleksey Navalniy.

by Patrick Armstrong

ELECTION. The last polls are published and it’s clear Putin will win on the first round. VTsIOM. FOM and Levada all agree and their numbers average out at: Putin 60-61%; Zyuganov 15%; Zhirinovskiy 8-9%; Prokhorov 7-8% and Mironov 6%. As always, any significant variation from these numbers will be cause for suspicion. I reiterate that when the final results – as the Duma ones did – correspond to long series of opinions polls from different sources then the burden of proof is on those that say the results were cooked. Really robust evidence is needed to counter the appearance of the expected. This fact ought to be apparent to the meanest intellect but for some reason is no t. I expect the customary incompetent and biased reporting from the Western media. Once again, the runners-up will not be the “liberals” so lionised by Western observers but the Communist and Zhirinovskiy nominees. The rest – however many there may be – compete for 10% to 15%. But that truth – an immutable law of Russian elections since 1991 – seems to be unable to be grasped by so many outside observers who really think that the inclusion of, say, Yavlinskiy would make some difference. Not to Putin’s vote, not to Zyuganov’s vote and not to Zhirinovskiy’s vote.

by Patrick Armstrong

Silent majority. United Russia is not a party to get excited about. It’s made up of apparatchiks who like power and all that it brings. No one who votes for it is proud of doing so. Its program is boring: support the Boss and more of the same. But more of the same isn’t so bad for millions of Russians who endured the lawlessness, disorder and poverty of the 1990s. Their lives are better by every measurement: more employment, better wages, longer life span, more freedom in the useable sense, higher pensions, improved medical care, more and better infrastructure, more opportunities. So millions of Russian voted for more of the same. Putin is the symbol – and for very good reason – of the measurable and real improvements in the situation of Russians.

by Patrick Armstrong

Candidates. The rules say that nominees of parties in the Duma are easily registered. So Putin (United Russia), Mironov (Just Russia), Zhirinovsky (LDPR) and Zyuganov (KPRF) were all registered early. Independents must produce two million signatures (a process that requires money and organisation). Mikhail Prokhorov (independent), who has lots of the first, passed and was officially registered The CEC rejected Yavlinskiy (Yabloko) saying that a second check of 400,000 signatures turned up 23% invalid. Yavlinskiy says he will appeal. This would mean that Yabloko members could not be elections observers but Putin and Prokhorov have said they will give them mandates to do so. The signature collection process is rife with fraud and easily-discovered technicalities.

by Patrick Armstrong

Medvedev speech. He gave his annual speech to parliament last week. As is customary he started with achievements. Quite a list in fact: improvements in the economy overall, in the demographic situation, poverty reduction, military improvement. All true enough, albeit presented as positively as possible. But, in the present situation, his proposals for political reform are the most interesting. And, given the continuing existence of The Team, we may assume that these have Putin’s approval and will become law. The principal ones – and, he said, more will be coming – are the return to direct election of regional heads, the creation of a proportional voting system for districts (sounds like a return to the previous system of half individual representative and half party vote) and the reduction of the numbers of signatures required to register a party or presidential candidate.Instructions were given to the government and a bill on the last was sent to the Duma.

Demonstrations. On Sunday there was a small (~500) nationalist demo, Monday saw 5-6K turn out for the authoritiesbut the big one was Saturday’s. I am going with Alexandre Latsa’s estimates – he was there, took pictures and made a methodical estimate. He tells me he estimates about 25-30K at the maximum with many coming and going for a total over the day of maybe 50K. There were demonstrations around the country, so about 75K would be a decent estimate across Russia. Who were they?

by Patrick Armstrong

Election results. The almost final results give a Duma with 238 seats for United Russia (down 77); 92 Communists (up 35); 64 Just Russia (up 26) and 56 Zhirinovskiy’s party (up 16). (Interactive map by regions). United Russia will dominate, but no longer be able to bully. Which is a step in the right direction.

Some attention has been paid to an address to the Russian people on 23 November in which President Medvedev set out Russia’s possible reaction should its concerns about the European Missile Defence system not be accommodated. For once, the Western media reported it reasonably accurately with most news outlets echoing the BBC’s heading: “Medvedev sees arms race if missile shield not agreed”. A conditional statement: if this, then that.

Duma Election. There have been innumerable reports that Russians are sick and tired of political realities; we hear this every time an election comes up (after all, a prevailing meme is that Putin & Co only hold onto power by cheating and manipulation) and it’s forgotten until the next time. However, there does seem to be some genuine evidence that people are getting tired of United Russia. This is The Team’s dilemma: while it has successfully constructed a “pedestal party”, something that eluded Yeltsin, United Russia is still little more than a grouping of those in power and those who want to be. Many of its apparatchiks are not very popular in local areas.