Who is this candidate who wants to defeat Putin and stop the war?

Since Saturday, despite the freezing cold, thousands of Russians have been waiting to sign their initials in support of Boris Nadezhdin, who is largely unknown to the general public. One by one, they enter the election headquarters whose entrance is stamped with the words: “Open the doors of the future”. If they are there, it’s because the former elected official, who has worked in liberal opposition but has moved increasingly with authorities, says he opposes Russian aggression in Ukraine.

So far, Boris Nadezhdin, who has connections within the regime, has not been targeted by the crackdown that has nevertheless decimated Russian civil society since Moscow’s mass entry of troops into Ukraine in February 2022.

“Without Fear of Arrest”

Again on Sunday, during a debate on YouTube with Yulia Latini, a Russian journalist now in exile, he reiterated that he was for peace and wanted to end mobilization if elected. In recent months, he declared that Russia “must elect a new president” and called the intervention in Ukraine a “fatal mistake” by Vladimir Putin.

To run in the presidential election, he must first collect 100,000 voter signatures by January 31. His site claimed to have collected about 85,000 as of Monday evening. His situation is an exception in Russia, where almost all figures opposed to the attack on Ukraine have fled the country or are in prison. As are thousands of anonymous people elsewhere. Other presidential candidates are careful not to express even the slightest criticism of Russian aggression and Putin.

Among the queue of signatories, Ivan Seminov, a 19-year-old biotechnology student, says he came to support Nadezhdin because he was “touched by these amazing images that were circulated on social networks this weekend, with many people sustaining coming (on)”. . “For many people it is possible to express disagreement with what is happening without fear of being arrested or fired,” the young man explains.

“hope”

Originally from Omsk, in western Siberia, nurse Natalia Avdieva drove through Moscow to run into an opposition election office. He is “surprised with joy” to see such a crowd. “We are all united here to support a candidate who opposes special operations,” said the 53-year-old woman, using the euphemism needed to talk about the conflict.

A liberal deputy in the lower house of parliament, the Duma, in the early 2000s, Boris Nadezhdin was close to the opposition Boris Nemtsov, who was assassinated in 2015. In recent years, he has become close to political groups close to the Kremlin, without completely following them. the line

Vladimir Putin, in power for almost a quarter of a century, should be re-elected to the Kremlin in mid-March. However, it is with enthusiasm that hundreds of anonymous people line up in front of Nadejdine’s office. Some note that the candidate’s last name also inspires them, its origin is similar to the word “nadezhda”, “hope” in Russian.