“Vladimir Putin is on course to win his fifth term as Russia’s president in an election that started on March 15, extending his quarter-century rule and keeping him in power until at least 2030,” Bloomberg reports.
“Already Russia’s longest-serving Kremlin leader since Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, Putin faces no serious competition in the election that’s tightly controlled by the Kremlin. He’s extending his rule with Russia’s two-year war in Ukraine showing no sign of ending and as its economy continues to hum despite unprecedented international sanctions.”
“Putin repeatedly insisted he wouldn’t change the constitution in order to keep power. But he did just that in 2020, overhauling the law to reset the presidential clock and allow himself potentially another two terms. That would take him to 2036, when he’d be 83. At the end of his second term in 2008, Putin stood down and installed Dmitry Medvedev as president to comply with term limits, while he continued to run the country as prime minister. This time, with a revised term limit, he has no need for such a maneuver.”
New York Times: Here’s what to know about Russia’s presidential vote.
