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The Choice of Millions. Dollars
The campaign for elections to the fourth session of the State Duma of the RF was the most financially transparent of all campaigns conducted in the ten years of the Russian electoral system’s existence. The results of the voting showed that money decides a lot, but not everything
The Fate of Party Millions
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| Dmitry Azarov |
| President of Adygea, Khazret Sovmen, who declared billions of rubles in income and savings, became a symbol of the openness of information in the election campaign |
Nine of the 23 parties and blocs that took part in the elections spent the equivalent of $1 million or more on the election campaign. These were the Union of Right Forces (SPS), which spent about $7.3 million; United Russia (Edinaya Rossiya), which spent about $6.6 million; the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) and Yabloko (approx. $4.7 million each); the Homeland (Rodina) bloc, which spent around $3.2 million; the Party of Russian Revival–Russian Party of Life (Partiya vozrozhdeniya Rossii–Rossiiskaya partiya zhizni), which spent around $2.9 million; the Russian Party of Pensioners and Party of Social Justice (Rossiiskaya partiya pensionerov i Partiya sotsialnoi spravedlivosti), which spent about $2.4 million; the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (KPRF), which spent about $1.8 million; and True Patriots of Russia (Istinnye patrioty Rossii), which spent around $1.4 million.
If the entry of a party into the Duma can be regarded as the normal result of investing funds in the election campaign, then about $19 million dollars were wasted, while a smaller amount (less than $15 million) helped four parties and blocs get into parliament. We also note that parties that invested less than $1 million in their election campaign did not make it into the Duma. On the other hand, the party with the largest election budget, the SPS, did not make it into the Duma either.
As shown by the rating “How much one vote and one mandate cost the winners. Top 4,” candidates for the LDPR paid the most for seats in the Duma: more than 3.8 million rubles (about $132 000) per mandate. Thriftiest of all were the Communists, who spent only around one-third as much on each deputy (about 1.3 million rubles or $44 000). However, if you divide total expenditures by the number of voters who cast their ballot for a given party, it turns out that none of the four parties and blocs that entered the Duma spent very much per voter: the amount ranged from 6.88 rubles for Communist Party supporters to 19.99 rubles for LDPR supporters, i.e., never more than a dollar in any case, even at the lowest dollar rate. Interestingly enough, the losing parties spent both larger and smaller amounts per vote. Political pygmies like the Party of Peace and Unity (Partiya mira i edinstva), which spent 41 kopecks per vote, and Rus United Russian Party (Rus), which spent 375.54 rubles per vote, were especially notable.
The Fate of Personal Millions
Information on finances and property that the candidates declared in the Duma during the election campaign showed that the previous Duma (third session) had at least seven dollar millionaires in its ranks. Their names and party affiliations are as follows: Vladislav Reznik and Valery Yazev (Edinaya Rossiya), Igor Annensky and Gennady Semigin (KPRF), Suleiman Kerimov (LDPR), Vladimir Medvedev (Rus), and Gadzhi Makhachev [People’s Party (Narodnaya partiya)].
About 30 candidates whose annual income or bank account (or both) exceeded the equivalent of $1 million took part in the election campaign. One of these millionaires, Vladimir Dubov, was struck off Edinaya Rossiya’s lists, apparently for owning a block of shares in the disgraced YUKOS Oil Company. The Central Election Committee elevated two other candidates to dollar millionaires. Vitaly Yuzhilin (Rodina) and Vladimir Tetelmin [Great Russia–Eurasian Union (Velikaya Rossiya–Evraziisky soyuz)] were falsely accused of hiding large incomes but managed to clear their names before the elections.
With allowance for all corrections to the deputies’ mandates, 27 dollar millionaires ran for election (see the rating “Dollar millionaires who ran for election to the fourth Duma session. Top 27”). Most of them ran on party lists.
Ten of the 27 millionaire candidates belonged to Edinaya Rossiya. Only one of them, Valery Yazev, ran in a single-member constituency. More than half of those who turned out to vote in Nizhny Tagil consitituency voted for him.
Four dollar millionaires each from the KPRF and SPS took part in the elections; Communist Gennady Semigin was the only one of them to run in a single-member constituency and win. The other seven ran on party lists, but whereas the Communist millionaires were lucky, the millionaires from the SPS were not. The dollar millionaires from the LDPR, which entered the Duma, also ran on party lists.
The Rodina bloc had the smallest number of wealthy candidates among the winning parties. However, two days before the elections, its single millionaire candidate, banker Aleksandr Lebedev, announced he was quitting the bloc.
Three of the remaining millionaire candidates (businessmen Gennady Pushko and Konstantin Kagalovsky, and deputy of the previous Duma, Vladimir Medvedev) ran on the lists of parties that did not surmount the 5% barrier. Two more stood for election in single-member constituencies. Gadzhi Makhachev, a deputy of the third Duma session, who ran in Makhachkala (Dagestan), was elected to the fourth Duma session; but businesswoman Natalya Sysoev, who ran in Yenisei constituency of Krasnoyarsk Territory, came in only third in the results and missed becoming the only woman millionaire in the new Duma.
To sum up, three of the seven dollar millionaires in the previous Duma session were reelected to the new session in single-member constituencies, while the other four (along with four newcomers) lost. The parties will decide the future of the rest.
The Fate of the Sociological Hundredths
If Russia had an advanced political adding machine, those who relied on public opinion polls would be losers. Actually, sociologists predicted correctly; they were simply misunderstood.
There were no surprises in the elections of December 7, 2003. The election results were in complete agreement with data from pre-election public opinion polls, as well as with sociologists’ predictions. It all comes down to the concept of “statistical error.” In nearly all the analyses, it varied within the limits of 3–4%, as the sociologists always honestly warned. If a certain party received, say, 5% of the votes according to public opinion poll data, this meant that in the elections it might receive from 1 to 9% of the votes. The difference is extremely important from the party’s point of view, as you’ll agree.
In addition, more than half the voters did not vote at all. This means that the election results reflected the political views only of those who actually voted, whereas the public opinion polls reflected the mood of the entire electorate.
The sociologists all “robbed” the winning party. None of the polls or forecasts gave Edinaya Rossiya more votes than it actually received. Efim Galitsky, a senior staff member of the Public Opinion Foundation (FOM), made the most accurate guess of the party of power’s results: he was short by only 0.67% of the votes.
In contrast, nearly all sociologists promised the Communists more votes than voters gave them. The most accurate data turned out to be a public opinion poll conducted on November 12 by the Agency for Regional Political Surveys (ARPI), which erred by 0.61% of the votes. Interestingly enough, later ARPI polls predicted a more disappointing and less accurate election outcome for the Communists.
Everyone shortchanged the LDPR on votes. Among those who underestimated the least were two FOM experts: Efim Galitsky, who has already been mentioned, and technical director Aleksei Churikov. Both of them were out by only 2.15% of the votes, which is well within statistical error.
Everyone shortchanged Rodina as well. FOM expert Aleksei Churikov can boast of the smallest shortfall, which again was within statistical error.
Sociologists made few mistakes with respect to Yabloko. Nearly all the experts guessed the number of votes received by Yabloko with an error of less than 1%. Even the All-Russian Center for Public Opinion Studies-Analytical Service (VTsIOM-A), which overall made the least accurate predictions, erred by no more than 2% in this case, which again is within statistical error. However, even 1% was worth a lot to Yabloko, since the party was only 0.66% short of the votes required to enter parliament. Once again, the best predictions came from FOM: a poll conducted on November 8 and 9 and a forecast by Aleksei Churikov gave equally exact results.
The story with SPS is similar to Yabloko. Sociologists gave the party an extra percentage point or so; but even this percentage and a bit was not enough for SPS to overcome the 5% barrier. The most accurate prediction for SPS came from an FOM poll conducted on November 1 and 2.
In conclusion, the Public Opinion Foundation most accurately predicted the parliamentary election results by a clear margin.
Al Casey
All the Article in Russian as of Jan. 12, 2004
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