Pamfilova said this extra time would allow her commission to 'carefully' consider any filed voter complaints, although she also noted so far only 10 of the 82 regions holding elections had registered any such reports. Usually, election results in Russia are announced either immediately after polls close or the next day. With voting under way, Russia's Central Election Commission Chairwoman Ella Pamfilova said she had sent a letter to regional election commissions recommending they submit vote tallies no sooner than September 14. In Moscow, voters were allowed to cast ballots as early as September 9 to choose members of 125 district councils: local legislative councils that mostly decide on extremely local issues such as new playground equipment, trash removal, or other quality-of-life concerns.ĭon't Mention The War? In Russian Regional Voting, Glimpses Of A Closing Society Voters in six regions were also choosing new members of local legislatures. In all, 15 regions - scattered from the Baltic Sea exclave of Kaliningrad to Buryatia, in southern Siberia - will choose new governors or top executives for their regions. Rather, local issues such as public transit investments or environmental concerns, or decrepit housing stock, topped the list of campaign issues in many places holding votes.

The balloting on September 11 is not expected to yield major political shifts on either the national or local level, and the war in Ukraine featured only in isolated cases in pre-election campaigns. Russians are voting in regional and local elections in a scattering of locations across the country, choosing governors or legislators in the first vote to be held since the Ukraine invasion nearly seven months ago.

Local elections in ukraine 2020