A Russian polling district in southern Siberia has scrambled to recount votes after presidential candidate Nikolai Kharitonov received more votes than Vladimir Putin in the March 15 to 17 election, according to local media reports.
Voting results were recounted at a polling station in the city of Barnaul in the Altai Republic after the Russian electoral commission found a “technical error.” It resulted in veteran candidate Kharitonov of the Communist Party receiving 763 votes—10 times more than the number of votes for Putin, independent Russian publication Meduza reported. The new results are still unknown. Newsweek has contacted Russia’s Foreign Ministry via email for comment.
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Exit polling published by the state-run Russian Public Opinion Research Center and the Public Opinion Foundation found that Putin won 87 percent of the vote in the presidential election, cementing his rule for a further six years.
Under constitutional changes made prior to the war in Ukraine, Putin may remain in power until 2036.
The United States has denounced Putin’s claim to a landslide election victory as “obviously not free nor fair.” Voting results also included totals from five regions of Ukraine that are occupied by Russia.
Russia’s elections have historically been marred by manipulation, ballot stuffing and forced voting. Putin’s biggest critics are typically barred from running for president, while opposition figures have often been jailed or are exiled.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov previously said that Russia’s presidential election is “not really democracy” but a “costly bureaucracy.” He forecast at least a 90 percent victory for Putin this year.
On Monday morning, Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Maria Zakharova said the number of people who took part in the Russian presidential elections abroad—372,779—was “unprecedented.”
“The numbers, of course, are unprecedented,” she said on state-run TV, news agency Tass reported. She added that there was a huge rush at some polling stations, “which was, among other things, stimulated by the fact that a number of consulates general were closed in unfriendly countries.”
Tass said a record turnout was recorded in this year’s presidential election. Putin credited the turnout to huge public support.
“All the plans we have created to develop Russia will certainly be carried out and their goals achieved,” Putin told reporters in Moscow. “We have come up with grandiose plans and will do everything to carry them out.”
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.