JRL NEWSWATCH: “Navalny jailing exposes failure of elected opposition parties to challenge Putin” – Financial Times
“Tensions between party leaders and members intensify as parliamentary elections loom.”
“… Navalny’s … anti-corruption investigators and regional political activists built the biggest political challenge to Putin’s 21 years in power. … result[ing] in [Navalny] being arrested and jailed … after surviving a nerve agent poisoning. But Navalny’s opposition movement, which led 100,000 people to protest against his arrest … has also exposed the failure of Russia’s elected opposition parties to challenge Putin’s rule. … [W]hile United Russia … head[s] into September’s election … at a historic low of 29 per cent, the Kremlin knows … any swing towards the systemic opposition will not alter its control of parliament in the same way … a non-systemic party would. …”