Russian presidential candidates begin election campaign in mass media

Russian presidential candidates begin election campaign in mass media

Russia’s 2018 presidential election race is entering the phase of campaigning in the mass media on Saturday, February 17 - the most thrilling and intriguing phase of all. Voters will be able to see the opinions of rivals clash in televised debates, TASS reports.

Not all candidates will participate in the debates, though. For instance, the incumbent president, Vladimir Putin, will refrain from using this opportunity.

Any candidate is free to begin the election campaign starting from the moment of submitting the application to the Central Election Commission. It is allowed to arrange for public events, meet with voters and distribute handouts. Electioneering in the mass media is possible only during the period of 28 days before the voting day. Taking part in the campaign will be only the registered candidates whose names feature in the ballot papers, and also the parties that nominated them.

The election period will end one day before the polling date, March 17.

The law establishes certain opportunities for electioneering in the mass media. Free time on the air is provided by five government-run federal television channels - Rossiya 1, Rossiya 24, Channel 1, TV Center and Russia’s public television OTR and three radio stations - Radio Russia, Mayak and Vesti FM. About 60 hours of air time on TV and 36 hours of air time on the radio were distributed by drawing lots at the CEC office.

One-third of the air time is granted to political parties, which are free to use it for telecasting electioneering ads.

As the CEC’s secretary Maya Grishina said earlier, the self-nominees (in this election campaign there is only one such candidate - Vladimir Putin), will have just a quarter of the air time to telecast electioneering ads of the amount a political party’s candidate is entitled to. Two candidates lost this opportunity because they refused to participate in the lots drawing procedure.

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