Court Reinstates Navalny Team Leader In St. Petersburg To Municipal Vote Ballot
(Article text ©2019 RFE/RL, Inc., Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty – rferl.org – Aug. 26, 2019 – article text also appeared at rferl.org/a/court-reinstates-navalny-team-leader-in-st-petersburg-to-municipal-vote-ballot/30129706.html)
Aleksandr Shurshev, the head of the local chapter of Aleksei Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation, has been reinstated on the list of registered candidates for upcoming municipal elections.
In an August 26 appeal hearing, the St. Petersburg city court ruled Shurshev and another candidate, journalist Maksim Kuzakhmetov, must be reregistered for the municipal elections after being removed from the list through a court order in mid-August.
The registration of opposition and independent candidates to the September 8 municipal elections in St. Petersburg and Moscow has become a hot topic in recent weeks as activists rallied in Russia’s two largest cities to demand fair and free polls.
Members of the ruling United Russia party complained that candidates had been registered after a June 30 deadline, even though St. Petersburg’s election commission had prolonged the registration period to July 14.
On August 14, a court accepted their argument and 11 candidates representing the Yabloko party, the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, and independent hopefuls were removed from the list of registered candidates.
Appeals by the other candidates removed from the list are pending.
Based on reporting by Fontanka and Interfax
[featured images are file photos from other times and places]