Putin wins six more years as president amid fraud claims

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin won six more years in the Kremlin, exit polls and preliminary results showed, amid allegations of fraud similar to those that sparked protests after a December parliamentary vote.

Putin, 59, who's been in power for 12 years including the last four years as premier, got 58.3 percent of the vote, the All-Russian Center for the Study of Public Opinion, or VTsIOM, said, citing an exit poll of 159,161 people. Putin got 59.3 percent, according to an exit poll by the Public Opinion Foundation, or FOM. He scored 61.81 percent, with 15.1 percent of votes counted, the Central Electoral Commission said. Official results are due tomorrow.

As European nations adopt record austerity measures that have toppled governments from Spain to Romania, Putin vowed to raise spending on social programs and the military. The Russian leader stepped up campaign pledges as his support slid during the worst protests in more than a decade.

“We link Putin with our future and stability,” retired military serviceman Leonid Mayorov said as he voted in Moscow. “A lot needs to be done but a lot has been achieved already, and that's why we vote for him.”

Ruble, Stocks

The ruble has gained 9.7 percent against the dollar this year, the third-best performance among currencies tracked by Bloomberg, behind the Hungarian forint and the Polish zloty. The benchmark Micex stock index is up 15 percent.

The cost of insuring government debt against non-payment for five years using credit-default swaps fell to 179 basis points on March 2, its lowest level since Aug. 17, according to data provider CMA, which is owned by CME Group Inc. and compiles prices quoted by dealers in the privately negotiated market.

Putin's pledges may raise government spending by as much as 4.8 trillion rubles ($164 billion), or 5 percent of economic output, through 2018, Capital Economics estimates. As president, he may have to deal with a widening budget deficit as well as continuing street protests.

“Putin may have won the election but the challenges he's been facing in the past few months won't go away,” said Masha Lipman, an analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center. “There is deep frustration and anger and protests will continue.”

Slide Reversed

Putin's support plummeted last year, culminating in rallies that brought tens of thousands of people to the streets of Moscow and other major cities to protest alleged fraud in the ruling United Russia party's victory in Dec. 4 elections. The Russian leader's vows to raise state salaries and pensions in campaign trips across the country reversed the slide in his ratings according to pollsters.

Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov came second with 17.7 percent backing, according to VTsIOM. He was followed by billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov with 9.2 percent and Vladimir Zhirinovsky of the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party with 8.5 percent. According to the preliminary results, Zyuganov scored 17.9 percent, Zhirinovsky 8 percent and Prokhorov 7.5 percent.

The election was “illegitimate, unfair and lacked transparency,” Zyuganov said on state television. He declined to congratulate Putin on his victory or recognize the outcome.

Putin's election is “illegitimate” and protests led by middle-class Russians won't die down, said former Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov, an opposition leader.

‘We Will Continue'

“We will continue to call people to the streets,” Kasyanov said by phone. “Mr. Putin has been selected as the winner of this so-called election, and the middle-class in Moscow and other cities know that without this pressure we won't achieve anything.”

The opposition, which will hold a protest tomorrow evening in central Moscow, is calling for new parliamentary and presidential elections in March 2013 and March 2014, said Kasyanov.

Allegations of voter fraud are exceeding reports received during the conduct of the election three months ago, Alexey Navalny, an anti-corruption blogger and opposition leader, told the Ekho Moskvy radio station. More than 3,000 reports of violations had been registered nationwide as of 6:40 p.m. in Moscow, the state-run RIA Novosti reported.

Opposition parties including the Communists have alleged United Russia inflated its result in December to about 50 percent, having won closer to 30 percent of the vote. International observers said the elections were marred by ballot-stuffing.

‘Already Evident'

“It is already evident that the violations are clearly and indisputably affecting the outcome of the vote and yet again show that these are not real elections,” said Navalny.

The election was the cleanest elections in the “entire history of Russia,” Putin's campaign manager, Stanislav Govorukhin, told reporters after the first results were released.

Authorities installed web cameras in more than 91,000 polling stations in a bid to allay concerns about fraud. The Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe, which is deploying 230 observers together with the Council of Europe, said in a report last month that the cameras couldn't capture “all the details of the voting process, in particular during counting.”

Putin and his wife, Lyudmila, cast their ballot at the Russian Academy of Sciences in the capital. Putin told reporters that he hoped for a “good result” for himself and that he hadn't heard of any irregularities to that point.