Russian President Vladimir Putin today said he would seek a new six-year term in the country\u2019s March elections in a move that would make him the longest- serving Russian leader since Joseph Stalin.<\/p>\n
Putin, who has been in power for the past 18 years, is expected to sail to victory, with only token opponents competing against him.<\/p>\n
\u201cI will offer my candidacy for the post of president of the Russian Federation,\u201d he said during a visit to a car factory in Nizhny Novgorod.<\/p>\n
He made the widely-expected announcement surrounded by cheering workers, who prodded him to unveil his plans in a carefully-choreographed ceremony.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is perhaps no better place and better excuse to announce this,\u201d Putin said in a nod to his core constituency.<\/p>\n
\u201cRussia will go only forward! And no-one would ever stop her in this direction.\u201d<\/p>\n
Predictably, a chorus of Russian politicians praised the announcement, while social networks were abuzz, with many ridiculing the Kremlin strongman.<\/p>\n
Top Putin critic Alexei Navalny, who has earlier declared a Kremlin bid even although he will not be allowed to run due to a suspended sentence for fraud, called Putin a \u201cswindler.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI suggest we don\u2019t agree,\u201d the 41-year-old Western- educated lawyer said on Twitter, referring to Putin\u2019s plans to seek a fourth Kremlin term.<\/p>\n
Putin\u2019s confirmation of the Kremlin bid came as Russia reeled from a decision by the International Olympic Committee to ban the country from the Winter Games as punishment over claims of state-orchestrated doping.<\/p>\n
But despite a litany of mounting problems including corruption, poverty and poor healthcare, the 65-year-old leader enjoys approval ratings of some 80 percent.<\/p>\n
Just hours earlier Putin visited a glitzy ceremony for volunteers in Moscow where he sought to rouse supporters.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to ask, do you trust and support me?\u201d he addressed the huge audience of mostly young people.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes!\u201d the audience chanted.<\/p>\n
Before Putin took the floor prominent figures, including athletes and Soviet-era celebrities such as 83-year-old actor Vasily Lanovoi, took to the stage to extol the country\u2019s successes, such as Soviet victory in World War II.<\/p>\n
Cosmonaut Sergei Ryazansky addressed the audience via video link from the International Space Station.<\/p>\n
Putin has sought to appeal to the country\u2019s youth after thousands of young Russians took to the streets earlier this year to protest alleged corruption among the elites, targeting Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev among others.<\/p>\n
The demonstrations were sparked by a documentary fronted by Navalny.<\/p>\n
Putin, who first became president after Boris Yeltsin sensationally resigned on New Year\u2019s Eve 1999, handed power to his ally Medvedev in 2008 at the end of his second term.<\/p>\n
Putin served as prime minister — though few doubted who was really in charge — and returned as president in 2012.<\/p>\n
If he extends his rule to 2024, Putin will have led Russia longer than Leonid Brezhnev, who presided over an era of stagnation from 1964 to 1982 and became the target of derision in his later years.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf he left the system he himself created he would become weak and vulnerable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Analysts say that after more than 17 years of leadership<\/p>\n
Many Russians say they would vote for Putin simply because they don\u2019t see an alternative to him amid the former KGB officer\u2019s chokehold on domestic politics.<\/p>\n
With the result of the election already a foregone conclusion, turnout could be low, dealing a blow to the Kremlin\u2019 hopes for a decisive new mandate, observers say.<\/p>\n
According to a poll conducted by the independent Levada Centre pollster last month, just 58 percent of respondents said they would take part in the polls, down from 75 per cent in December 2007.<\/p>\n
Putin\u2019s spokesman Dmitry Peskov stressed this week that those figures came ahead of the start of a political campaign, saying they were set to grow.<\/p>\n
Many expect that Kseniya Sobchak, a 36-year-old glamourous former host of a television reality show and daughter of Putin\u2019s former mentor, will likely be allowed to run against Putin to rekindle public interest in the dull election.<\/p>\n
With the election virtually devoid of any suspence, the question is what will happen after Putin\u2019s expected re- election and later, after his new term ends in 2024, analysts say.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Russian President Vladimir Putin today said he would seek a new six-year term in the country\u2019s March elections in a move that would make him the longest- serving Russian leader since Joseph Stalin. Putin, who has been in power for the past 18 years, is expected to sail to victory, with only token opponents competing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12164,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12163"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12165,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12163\/revisions\/12165"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}