Putin’s Rival Can’t Run for President, But He’s Still a Threat
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who submitted endorsement papers necessary for his registration as a presidential candidate, center, heads to attend a meeting in the Russia's Central Election commission in Moscow on Monday, Dec. 25, 2017. Russian election officials have formally barred Navalny from running for president.
Photographer: Evgeny Feldman/Navalny Campaign via AP IMAGESNow that he’s been officially barred from challenging Russian President Vladimir Putin in presidential elections next March, opposition leader Alexey Navalny is counting on becoming an even bigger nuisance for the Kremlin. The 41-year-old Navalny, who is banned from appearing on state television and whose name Putin never even mentions in public, is urging his supporters to protest nationwide on Jan. 28 as part of a campaign to boycott the vote.
“Going to vote now just means fixing Putin's problems by helping him disguise his reappointment as something that looks like an election,” Navalny wrote on his blog after Russia’s Central Election Commission refused to register him as a candidate due to a fraud conviction that Navalny denounces as politically motivated. In a video, he accused Putin of being “afraid of running against me.”