MOSCOW: Despite seeing significant losses, the ruling pro-Kremlin party United Russia has emerged as the clear winner from the country's parliamentary elections, marred by repeated complaints over election fraud.
United Russia came in at 49.6 per cent, the election commission announced in Moscow on Monday, after more than 95 per cent of the votes had been counted.
However, this is down from the 54.2 per cent achieved during the last elections in 2016. Observers explain the loss with the population's discontent over falling wages and rising prices.
The communists benefited from this development, receiving 19.2 per cent of votes, up from 13.35 per cent five years ago.
The right-wing populist Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) of the ultra-nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky was projected to take 7.5 per cent of votes, while the A Just Russia party received 7.3 per cent. The New People party has cracked the 5-per-cent hurdle, according to the latest results.
They are all considered parties loyal to the system.
In the Far East region of Yakutia, also known as the Siberian Republic of Sakha, United Russia lost its majority, only coming in second with some 33 per cent of votes behind the communists at some35 per cent, an increase of almost 20 percentage points compared to the last elections, according to figures from the electoral commission.
According to observers, support for United Russia in the region is down due to the devastating forest fires that have been raging in there for months, with citizens unhappy with the authorities' response.
Representatives of United Russia requested a review of the count,according to the Yakutian election commission.
President Vladimir Putin's United Russia already celebrated its victory on Sunday evening, the final day of the three-day nationwide election, despite only a few votes having been counted at the time.The party hopes to garner a new majority of over 300 of the 450 seats in the country's lower house, the State Duma.
Meanwhile, observers and the opposition continued to speak of election fraud. Opposition candidates in Moscow complained of irregularities, saying online voting results there were still not published on Monday morning while there had already been results from other parts of the country a few hours after polling stations closed on Sunday evening.
The Kremlin stressed on Monday that the elections were "free and fair." Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told the Interfax news agency that the Kremlin assesses the election "quite positively."
Independent observers from the Golos organization however listed thousands of violations nationwide, including forced votes among civil servants, while the team of imprisoned Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny spoke of the "dirtiest election" in years.
Navalny, who was ineligible to run in this or any Russian election due to his criminal record, had been calling for a tactical protest vote against United Russia.
However a tactical voting app launched by Navalny's team was removed from Google and Apple stores on Friday.
Election Commissioner Ella Pamfilova and the Interior Ministry had confirmed individual violations and also cancelled thousands of ballots. However, they spoke of an insignificant number of complaints that had no influence on the vote as a whole.
Around 110 million people in Russia and abroad were called to vote for the new Duma. Voter turnout was reported at more than 45 per cent by early Sunday.
- dpa
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