The CEC appointed two members of the Khakass election commission and returned to the topic of “twins”

The Central Election Commission (CEC) on Wednesday appointed two voting members of Khakassia’s election commission. The CEC got the right to do it on its own, since the Supreme Council (SC) of the republic, according to the quota of which the retired electoral commissioners were appointed, is on vacation and does not plan to meet until the end of August. In addition, the head of the Central Election Commission, Ella Pamfilova, again raised the problem of “doubles” candidates, saying that only the political technology community itself can change the situation for the better, introducing for itself the limits and norms of what is permitted.

Party representation in the election committee of Khakassia has not changed after the appointment of two new members: they represent the same parties as their predecessors. As Kommersant reported, voting members of the Khakass Commission Tamara Shirkovets (A Just Russia – For Truth, SRZP) and Larisa Efimenko-Mikhailova (New People) resigned in early August.

Prior to that, on July 11, their powers were suspended due to a conflict of interest: the mother of Mrs. Shirkovets was nominated for the post of head of Khakassia and for deputies of the Supreme Court from the SRZP, and Ms. Efimenko-Mikhailova herself became a candidate for deputy of the Supreme Court, but from United Russia . After that, voting members of the electoral committee were reduced from 14 to 12, and then to 11 (due to the illness of another person), because of which the commission could not resolve the issues of registering the candidate from the Communists of Russia party Vladimir Grudinin for the post of head of Khakassia and the list of this party with his participation in the elections to the Armed Forces. As a result, the decision to register Mr. Grudinin and the list of “Communists of Russia” was taken by the CEC.

Secretary of the Central Election Commission Natalya Budarina said at a meeting on August 16 that the Supreme Council of Khakassia had applied to the CEC on August 3 with a request to appoint new members of the republican commission. The parties whose representatives dropped out sent new proposals, and lawyers Sofya Melekhina (SRZP) and Lyubov Semikova (New People) were appointed to the vacant seats.

According to the CEC, Ms. Melekhina graduated from Katanov Khakass University with a degree in jurisprudence and has experience in the electoral system: in particular, from 2020 to 2022 she was a voting member of the territorial election commission of Abakan, and later became deputy chairman of this commission. Ms. Semikova, according to the CEC, graduated from the Higher School of Economics with a degree in jurisprudence and, in addition, has a master’s degree in political science. She has experience as a member of the City Election Committee of St. Petersburg with an advisory vote. Ivan Misyuk, the secretary of the council of the Khakass branch of Novyi lyudi, Ivan Misyuk, explained to Kommersant the choice of the party by the fact that Lyubov Semikova had previously worked at the election headquarters of Novye lyudi in St. Petersburg: “There was a complex combined campaign for elections to the State Duma and the Legislative Assembly, but Love is very good coped, proved to be a competent, intelligent specialist.

In addition, at yesterday’s meeting, CEC chairman Ella Pamfilova returned to her statement a week ago regarding the nomination of “double” candidates. Recall that at a meeting on August 9, she was indignant at another manifestation of this technology in the Voronezh region, where six candidates with the surname Vakhtin were registered at the municipal elections at once, and two more Vakhtins were refused due to violations in the submission of documents. The head of the CEC then recalled that the rules on counteracting “twins” had already been tightened, but loopholes in the law still remained, and suggested that a black list of political technologists resorting to the nomination of “twins” be created.

Yesterday, Mrs. Pamfilova admitted that her statement had a “somewhat provocative” connotation: “I thought that everyone understood that this was a figure of speech, and not real, that we would now sit down and put something on paper. But I liked that it sparked a very lively discussion among political technologists, which is good.” In her opinion, no blacklists will be able to solve this problem until the political technology community itself, on the principles of self-regulation, determines the ethical framework and norms: what is allowed and what limits cannot be crossed.

At the same time, Ella Pamfilova added, doppelgangers in the elections are “not a problem,” although the CEC will continue to monitor them. For example, in Togliatti, where 227 candidates for the City Duma are registered, namesakes were found in six constituencies, the CEC chairman said. In one of them, the last name, first name and patronymic of the two candidates completely coincide: this is Alena Vladimirovna Dushkova, nominated by United Russia, and her full namesake from SRZP. The latter, according to Ms. Pamfilova, changed her surname and first name on July 7, 2023, and before that she was Anna Vladimirovna Stepanenko. “This will be indicated on the ballot in accordance with the law,” the head of the CEC warned. In another district there are two Valentina Semibratovs, but with different patronymics: one was nominated by the SRZP, the other by the “Communists of Russia”. The latter also changed her surname in July, after marriage, Ella Pamfilova specified. Information about this will also be reflected in the bulletin.

In four more Togliatti districts, according to the head of the Central Executive Committee, two namesakes will converge: Popovs, Sazonovs, Abramovs and Krasnovs. “In this case, everything was done according to the law. There is no such thing in the legislative base that if a namesake appears, then we do not register it. Since there is such a phenomenon, I do not know what else needs to be added to the law. In my opinion, everything that is possible, we have already added. There is the right of people, there are common surnames,” complained Mrs. Pamfilova.

Elena Rozhkova; Valery Lavsky, Novosibirsk