Interview with Vladimir Churov

2 Sep, 2007 08:21 / Updated 17 years ago

Vladimir Churov, Chairman of the Central Elections Committee, joined Russia Today to speak about December's parliamentary elections in Russia.

Russia Today: How different will this campaign be from previous election campaigns? Vladimir Churov: First of all, these are the first Russian parliamentary elections with a full proportional system. What does it mean? On December 2, Russian citizens will vote for the lists of party candidates from each party that will have a possibility to participate in these elections. So, that means that our citizens will vote commonly for a party and for concrete persons from party lists. RT: But why are not all parties taking part in this campaign? Would this mean that the parliament would be different because there will be fewer parties? V.C.: Theoretically today, all 15 Russian parties have chances to participate in the elections. How many of them will continue after the necessary procedures, I don’t exactly  know now. But I hope that the majority of these 15 parties will continue preparing for the elections.