Fake successor wins 18% in poll
One in five Russians would vote for Vladimir Putin’s anointed successor, Andrei Semyonov, in next year’s presidential elections if the incumbent Kremlin leader decided not to run himself, a new poll has found.
There’s a pretty important flaw in their candidate, however. Semyonov does not exist.
The question about imaginary candidate Semyonov in a recent survey about the next presidential election, due to be held March 18, 2018, as an “experiment,” pollsters at the independent Levada Center said.
Respondents were told that President Putin had recently expressed support for Semyonov as a presidential candidate. They were then asked if they had heard of Semyonov and whether they would personally vote for him.
The range of answers was complex. While 63 per cent said they had not heard of Semyonov and would not vote for him and a further 12 per cent said they could not answer the question, 15 per cent said they had not heard of Semyonov but would vote for him anyway.
In total, 11 per cent of respondents said they actually had heard of Semyonov — and 3 per cent said they had both heard of Putin’s preferred candidate and they would vote for him.
Asked about the poll, Kremlin spokes- person Dmitry Peskov told reporters that the result “only verifies the overwhelming confidence in the head of the Russian state and his human resources policy.”
Putin recently became the longest serving leader of Russia since the Soviet-era Joseph Stalin. He is yet to confirm whether he will run in next year’s presidential election, but polling show consistently high levels of support for his leadership.
In the same poll as they were asked about Semyonov, respondents were asked whom they would vote for if the election were held next Sunday.
Putin was a clear leader with 48-percent support; Gennady Zyuganov, leader of the Communist Party, was listed as closest leader with 2 per cent.