Thousands of Russians lined up to support the nomination of Boris Nadezhdincandidate in the presidential elections to be held in Russia in March 2024. Analysts naturally predict the victory of Vladimir Putin who will be running for the fifth time, but throughout the country several citizens have nevertheless decided to line up for several hours to put their signature in favor of Nadezhdin. Although many of them had only heard his name for the first time this autumn.
AN INDECIDED POLITICIAN – Boris Nadezhdin, 60 years old, is a municipal councilor in the region of Mosca who has never made himself known for particular initiatives, even if he likes to talk about himself as a politician with 30 years of experience. His career can hardly be called triumphant or even coherent. In the 1990s Nadezhdin was elected to the city council of Dolgoprudny, in the Moscow region. He managed to work as an advisor to Boris Nemtsova prominent opponent and critic of the Putin regime who was assassinated under suspicious circumstances in 2015, and as an assistant to Sergei Kiriyenkothe architect of the internal politics of Kremlin. In 1999 Nadezhdin was elected to the State Duma for the only time and since then he has no longer held positions of federal or regional importance.
In the following years, he collaborated with parties loyal to the regime and in 2015 he even participated in the primaries of United Russia the formation of Vladimir Putin. He attempted several times to be nominated by parties that, in the end, failed to enter the Duma. In recent years he has appeared mainly in political talk shows on federal channels, where he was assigned the role of the typical “opponent”. In 2022, Nadezhdin went public opposed to war, however, calling it a “special military operation” as imposed by the government. Answering journalists’ questions he repeatedly reiterated that he is not “a rebel” and underlined that he respects Russian legislation.
PACIFIST CANDIDATE – Therefore, a month ago, when Nadezhdin announced that he would run for president in 2024, no one had any doubts that his candidacy had been agreed with the Kremlin. The practice is not new: every time, before the presidential elections, some inconspicuous and independent-looking politician is assigned the role of “liberal” candidatewhose task is to attract protest votes and evaluate the opposition potential of the Russians. Nadezhdin, of course, categorically rejects these rumors. When asked by independent journalists “why is everyone punished for criticizing the war and you are not?”, the shy liberal replies: “I don’t know”.
It is obvious that the presidential administration will only admit candidates who have given a guarantee that they will not exceed certain limits. However, Nadezhdin may be the only one on the list who directly spoke out against it war in Ukraine. Today Nadezhdin calls himself a “principled opponent of Putin’s policy” who “has committed a fatal error launching the special operation”. If elected president, Nadezhdin promises to free all political prisonersto offer to Ukraine peace negotiations it’s a cease-fire, to bring the mobilized soldiers home and to form a new government. Furthermore, “he will offer Russia to abandon the comparison with the West” and the “forced” conflict with the Nato.
THE ONLY OPTION FOR THE OPPOSITIONS – Disputes immediately arose among Russian opposition politicians over Nadezhdin’s candidacy. Although he publicly condemns the war in Ukraine, opposes reparations and to collective responsibility of the Russians and does not accept the possibility of returning Ukraine to Crimeail Donbass or other occupied territories. He also promises that he will not extradite either Putin or Strelkov to bring them before the International Criminal Court in The Hague and, for example, justify the invasion of Georgia by Russia in 2008. However, in January, the Russian opposition reached a compromise and called on citizens to vote for Nadezhdin, the only candidate in the 2024 presidential campaign with a clear pacifist position. Politicians Maxim Kats e Mikhail Khodorkovskythe partners of Alexei Navalnyopposition bloggers and journalists admit that while it is difficult to “turn a blind eye” to his controversial reputation, there are no other options.
To run for office, Nadezhdin needed to raise 100 thousand companies of Russian citizens by the end of January. After being supported by these opinion leaders, the collection of signatures went better and the politician received not only the necessary votes, but many more: almost 200 thousand. Queues for signing formed not only in Russian cities, but also abroad: a Berlin, Amsterdam, Paris, Yerevan, Tbilisi, Tel Aviv and other centers of Russian emigration. All those who are against the war and in favor of the change of power. “Let there be at least one decent person on the ballot paper,” they say.
SYMBOL OF PROTEST – “Boris Nadezhdin’s personality has nothing to do with this. He is simply expressing the anti-war agenda,” explains the Russian opposition politician Mikhail Lobanov. Support for Nadezhdin essentially turned into a legal protest against the war. Kirill Rogovpolitical scientist and analytical project director Re:Russia, agrees that the figure of Nadezhdin is not that important: “Today, only the people who want to sign for him matter, only their number, only the queues. These people don’t sign for Nadezhdin, they sign for themselves.” The political scientist Ekaterina Shulman notes that such a public reaction indicates a pent-up social demand: the need for civil action that is not hopeless and not immediately punishable is very great. “It’s like a breath of fresh air in the situation of colossal tiredness due to the power of a single person,” writes the political scientist Abbas Galyamov.
Even the pro-government political scientist Sergei Markov he agrees: “The signatures in support of Nadezhdin are one sublimation of protest. People find legal and acceptable ways to say no to the authorities.” Furthermore, the crowds seem to refute the public discourse that there are few people who oppose this war and this regime. “The videos and photos of the queues produce a encouraging effect. It is clear that there remain people with an opposition mentality in the country,” says the journalist Dmitry Kolezev. In the meantime, the propagandists, taking the opportunity, ask to create a “database of these people potential terrorists“.
As for the authorities, the Kremlin says they do not consider Nadezhdin a real rival in the elections. Fyodor Krasheninnikova Russian opposition political analyst, confirms: “The reason why Nadezhdin was not blocked immediately is because he seemed completely hopeless”. By the way, few people believe that the regime will allow Nadezhdin to register as a candidate for the elections. The politician himself, after the outcry that made his name, admitted that he would simply be happy to survive all this: “I hope that at the end of this electoral campaign I will remain alive, free and not a foreign agent”.