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Eastern Europe
April 7, 2017 www.intellinews.com I Page 14
Putin’s popularity untouched by March protests but PM’s sinks
bne IntelliNews
The popularity of Russian President Vladimir Putin was almost untouched by the countrywide anti- corruption protests organised by opposition leader Alexei Navalny on March 26, but the numbers of his prime minister, Dmitry Medvedev, have tanked.
Navalny has clearly struck a chord with the electorate, with another Levada Center poll finding that 38% of Russians approved of the protests. But the corruption claims against the leadership have not done enough to light a fire under the population that could pose a challenge to Putin in the 2018 presidential election: only 10% said that they would vote for Navalny in the presidential poll, despite his higher public profile since the protests.
Putin has managed to stay above the political fray throughout his 16 years on the job, in keeping with the Russian proverb that “God is high above and the Tsar far away”. The president’s popularity fell from 84% in February to 82% in March, according to the latest poll from the independent pollster the
Levada Center, but still remains near record levels.
However, Medvedev’s approval ratings took a bath. He was the focus of Navalny’s anti-corruption rallies that followed on from a report he released earlier in the month detailing the premier’s alleged wealth, including an expensive duck house at a restored mansion Navalny says Medvedev owns.
Medvedev has been piggybacking off Putin’s ratings for years. After a poor start in the earlier part of this decade when his approval ratings were only in the high 30s, they have steadily risen to hover around the 50 mark for most of the last two years. The highest point they reached was 57% in November 2016. But his approval rating dropped following Navalny’s protests to 42%, a level he last saw in briefly in January 2016.
Medvedev addressed the corruption claims only this week, dismissing them as “complete nonsense” and claiming they were “politically
