Data on the number of voters in the new regions as of January 1 will not be published

The Central Election Commission (CEC) will not yet publish information on the number of voters in the DPR, LPR, Kherson and Zaporozhye regions as of January 1, 2023. Now every six months – on July 1 and January 1 – the CEC publishes data on the number of voting citizens throughout the country in breakdown by regions, as well as outside of Russia. But an exception has been made for four subjects of the Federation, says Vedomosti’s interlocutor in the system of election commissions. He explains this by the fact that martial law operates in the DPR, LPR, Kherson and Zaporozhye regions, under which elections are not held under Russian law. And CEC Deputy Chairman Nikolai Bulaev clarified that this was recorded by the decision of the CEC on December 21, 2022.

As Vedomosti previously wrote, the authorities are not abandoning the idea of ​​electing parliaments in new regions in 2023. This will require either the lifting of martial law or a change in the regulatory framework, says political strategist Oleg Zakharov. According to the interlocutor of Vedomosti in the system of election commissions, in any case, only citizens of Russia will be able to vote in these elections, and according to which documents this status will be determined depends on the legislator, since now only a person with passport.

“I think it’s possible [голосование по паспортам Украины или ДНР, ЛНР с местной пропиской] because most of the population has them,” says Vladislav Berdichevsky, deputy of the People’s Council of the DPR. At the same time, those who massively received Russian passports under a simplified procedure before joining the Russian Federation do not have registration, he says. Kirill Cherkashin, associate professor of political science at Donetsk National University, also believes that an exception can be made for the region, and then not only holders of Russian passports will be allowed to vote. “How many citizens we have with Russian passports will become clearer later, because many who received documents earlier do not have a residence permit, and it is quite difficult to get it now: it takes time, and there are queues at the migration services,” he said.

However, there is still time to issue Russian passports, Zakharov says. The experience of working in Crimea showed that it is not a problem to organize the work on issuing passports, he noted: “I am sure, given the fact that more and more new managers are sent there, this work will be organized, especially since there is time – now it is January, and the elections are in September , passports can be issued before voting day.”

On January 20, Bulaev told reporters that the CEC has “a database of citizens living there who have a Russian passport”: “There is an exact number and exact details. Full name, year of birth, registration to be specified. The place of registration is not so important when it comes to elections to the Legislative Assembly only on party lists, the source of Vedomosti notes. Earlier, Vedomosti wrote that there would be no elections of deputies in single-mandate constituencies in the new regions.