Putin Will Have 'No Competitors' in Russian Elections

Russian President Vladimir Putin will have no competition if he decides to run in the 2024 presidential election, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday.

"We have repeatedly said that President Putin is definitely the number one politician and statesman in our country," Peskov told reporters. "I believe, although I hardly have the right to speak about this or that, but, breaking the rules, I can say that he has no competitors and cannot have any in Russia."

Russia's 2024 presidential election is scheduled to be held on March 17 next year. Putin is expected to soon announce his bid for a sixth overall presidential term. Per constitutional changes made prior to the war in Ukraine, Putin may remain in power until 2036.

Newsweek has contacted Russia's Foreign Ministry for comment via email.

It's not the first time the Kremlin spokesperson has said Putin is almost guaranteed to be re-elected should he choose to run again.

In August, Peskov was quoted as saying that Russia's presidential election is "not really democracy" and forecasted a 90 percent victory for Putin next year.

"Our presidential election is not really democracy, it is costly bureaucracy," Peskov told The New York Times in an article published on August 6. "Mr. Putin will be re-elected next year with more than 90 percent of the vote."

After the remarks, Peskov wasn't seen in public for three weeks.

On the day of publication, state-run media cited Peskov as saying that his remarks had been misinterpreted and misreported.

"The author of the article interpreted [my words] in an absolutely wrong way," Peskov told state-run news agency Tass at the time, adding that he had met and spoken to the author of the report, and answered a question about the upcoming presidential election.

"And the answer was the following: the level of consolidation around the president is absolutely unprecedented and it can be said now that if he runs [for president], he will be reelected by an overwhelming majority, and the election."

Peskov said he told The Times that "the president insisted that the election be organized without fail, that this is what democracy requires."

He also told Russia's RBC news website that "although elections are a requirement of democracy and Putin himself has decided to hold them, theoretically it's possible not to hold them."

"Because it's already obvious that Putin will be elected," he said, noting that his statement is "absolutely [my] personal opinion."

Putin hasn't yet announced his re-election bid, but sources close to the Kremlin told national daily newspaper Kommersant that the start of the informal presidential campaign is scheduled for November.

"In accordance with the law, our parliament must make a decision at the end of the year," Putin said in September, when asked if he will run for re-election.

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