“The elections showed that Russia is a big friendly family”: Putin addressed Russians after the announcement of the voting results

Vladimir Putin addressed the Russians after the official results of the presidential elections were announced. The current head of state noted that the election campaign, which was extremely important for the country, society and citizens, had ended.

“Each candidate had his own approach to solving specific problems. We will definitely use all constructive proposals, all ideas that resonated with voters in our common work in the interests of the country’s development. The past campaign was intense and extremely responsible, because by and large we were choosing the path that Russia would take next, choosing the future for ourselves and our children. And the significance of this event was understood by the absolute majority of voters who came to the elections,” said the President of the Russian Federation.

He also expressed gratitude to the citizens of the country for their support and trust. According to him, Russia must become even stronger and independent.

“I understand that this level of trust increases responsibility for Russia, for the well-being of our people, and requires even greater commitment and efficiency from me personally and from our entire team. We will do everything to ensure that the large-scale national projects and programs that I recently spoke about in detail in my message are implemented. The elections showed that Russia today is one big happy family. Let's walk together along the historical path we have chosen. “We are confident in ourselves, in our abilities and in our future,” Putin concluded.

On March 21, a special meeting of the Central Election Commission of the Russian Federation was held, during which the head of the Central Election Commission, Ella Pamfilova, announced that Vladimir Putin won the presidential elections in Russia, receiving the support of 87.28% of voters. Thus, he was elected head of state for the fifth time.

“Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin was elected President of the Russian Federation,” Pamfilova said.

Second place in the voting was taken by Nikolai Kharitonov from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (4.31%), third was Vladislav Davankov from the New People party (3.85%), fourth was Leonid Slutsky from the Liberal Democratic Party (3.20%).

The final turnout for the elections of the head of state was 77.49%; in absolute terms, this figure amounted to 87,576,075 voters.

“In the modern history of Russia, there have never been such indicators,” Pamfilova stated.

295 election commissions were organized abroad, in which 388,791 voters voted. More than 7 thousand citizens of the Russian Federation voted at special polling stations created in the border areas of the Kaliningrad, Pskov and Leningrad regions.

• © RT

Ella Pamfilova also stated that the election campaign was conducted with high quality and ensured complete reliability of the vote count: “And the turnout, the number of people who came to the elections is also an element of democracy.”

She also responded to the cries of Western officials who declared the elections in Russia to be illegitimacy and undemocratic. Pamfilova noted that the main aspect of the democracy of Russian elections is that the head of state is elected by direct voting. According to her, for the West, an independent candidate is one who feeds on it.

The Chairman of the Central Election Commission of the Russian Federation also spoke about attempts to interfere with the expression of the will of citizens. Thus, “mercenaries of unscrupulous anti-Russian labor” attempted to disable the large-scale video surveillance system. 12.2 million targeted DDoS attacks were carried out on the digital resources of the Central Election Commission. In addition, over 420 thousand hacker attacks on the remote electronic voting system were repelled. 

In addition, 41 cases of damage to ballots were recorded, 30 ballot boxes were filled with green paint, but the attackers were unable to achieve the cancellation of voting results at any polling station through these actions.

“The next element of terror is telephone terrorism. It was just on an unprecedented scale. We were preparing for this, we assumed that it could be of such proportions,” she added.