Putin’s electioneering to start on Saturday

The collection of signatures in support of President Vladimir Putin’s participation in the 2024 presidential election will start on December 23, said doctor Maryana Lysenko, a co-chairperson of Putin’s election campaign HQ.

The HQ began to work in Moscow’s Gostinny Dvor on Thursday. It is co-chaired by Donetsk People’s Republic parliament speaker Artyom Zhoga, Tabakov Theatre Art Director Vladimir Mashkov and Moscow Hospital No 52 chief doctor Maryana Lysenko.

The HQ is open from 9:00 to 18:00 on working days, but in actual fact, it operates round-the-clock.

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On December 8, Putin announced his plans to run in the next presidential elections in 2024. A group of voters met in Moscow on December 16 to support Putin’s self-nomination. Two days later, the incumbent president submitted documents to the Central Election Commission for registration as a presidential candidate.

Under the law on the election of Russian president, a self-nominee needs the support from at least 500 people with full voting rights. The candidate then requests the CEC to register his or her group of supporters and attaches the required documents such as the candidate’s consent to run in the election and the voter group’s protocol supporting the candidate’s self-nomination.

The self-nominee has to gather at least 300,000 signatures in his support; the number of voter signatures in each region is capped at 7,500.  After completing all the procedures the candidate gets official registration.

As a self-nominee, Putin ran in the 2018 presidential election.*i*sb