He could remain at the head of Russia until 2036. President Vladimir Putin signed a law on Monday allowing him to run for two new presidential terms, when he should, in theory, have retired to the end of his current term in 2024, Russian law does not allow a president to serve more than two consecutive terms.
The text was definitively adopted by Parliament in March, after a constitutional referendum organized in the summer of 2020.
Carole Grimaud Potter, geopolitical analyst, specialist in Russia and professor at the University of Montpellier, explains how the Russian president came to establish this position of absolute sovereign, while stressing that this law is an observation of failure for the renewal of Russian political life.
Why did Vladimir Poutine launch this constitutional reform, in particular on the Russian presidency?
CAROLE GRIMAUD POTTER.
Vladimir Putin announced the constitutional reforms in January 2020. Among the significant amendments to the Constitution of 1993, the amendment concerning the President of the Russian Federation is very interesting: he says that anyone who has not resided permanently more than 25 years in Russia cannot be elected president.
Likewise, the candidate must never have been in possession of a foreign citizenship or a residence permit abroad.
This now excludes all opponents living abroad, and most Russian oligarchs who could have electoral aims one day or another ...
It is a way of protecting the presidency from foreign interference perceived as such by the Kremlin (Editor's note: the demonstrations of recent weeks, the Navalny case ...) or from the political stranglehold of oligarchs - although these have been brought to heel as soon as Putin came to power in the 2000s. Putin's “presidency-citadel” thus strengthened and consolidated, sheltered from all “threats” from inside and outside.
Is Putin really guaranteed to be reelected in the next two presidential elections?
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Everything leads to believe it, even if everything will be done so that a semblance of plurality is preserved.
Will the “smart vote” advocated by Navalny (which consists of voting against Putin rather than abstaining) be able to play a real role?
With the latter's imprisonment and the arrest of a large number of his collaborators, the government is counting on the movement running out of steam.
The Western vision, which consists of representing Putin clinging to power, must however be qualified.
We are facing a “failure” of the transfer of power: no personality among the elite circles close to power has been “chosen” by Putin.
This shows the void in the constitution of new elites within the Russian system, which Vladimir Putin himself created since the 2000s and which, paradoxically, weakens the system.
Deprived of renewal, power becomes sclerotic.
Power is aware of this, hence the reinforced authoritarianism and the “presidency-citadel”.
A vicious circle whose outcome we do not see very well… Until 2036 perhaps.
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Several foreign countries, especially European ones, have already expressed strong criticism of the weakening of democracy in Russia.
Doesn't this new law risk further cooling their relations?
Relations are already extremely tense, on different levels: Navalny, Sputnik vaccine, Syria, Libya ... And now a resumption of fighting in Ukraine, Russian troop movements at the borders and the concerns of Western diplomacy.
This new law, which was expected, just reinforces Western mistrust of Russia, which does not augur any relaxation to come in their relations.
