Putin party fails to get a majority in parliament

Guardian:

After more than a decade of unwavering popularity, Vladimir Putin's United Russia party was on Sunday nightpredicted to lose its majority in parliament, as voters used a national election to register concern at authoritarianism and corruption.

Early exit polls showed United Russia would lose its majority in the Duma, or lower house, and fail to win an absolute majority of votes as in the past. VTsIOM gave it 48.5%, and the Public Opinion Foundation gave it 46%, when polls closed in Russia's westernmost region of Kaliningrad. These numbers are liable to change, not least because they were accompanied by widespread reports of polling irregularities.

Four hours after the polls had closed, the central elections commission on Monday said that United Russia had won 50.07% of the vote, with 61.64% of ballot papers counted.

Through the preceding day of voting, voters had taken to social media to report apparent violations, at times marvelling at their creativity.

A YouTube user in east Moscow illustrated how the pens at booths in school #1114 were filled with invisible ink. In the Siberian city of Novokuznetsk, a user showed how ballot boxes had arrived at a polling site one-third filled with votes.

A Moscow user filmed an election official at polling station #2501 filling out ballots as he sat at his desk. Several users filmed buses, nicknamed "carousels", which appeared to be carrying the same people to various stations so they could vote over and over again.

"Today we have witnessed the dirtiest, foulest elections of the last 20 years," one opposition leader, said Boris Nemtsov, a former deputy premier. "We can't even call them elections – it's the theft of votes from the Russian people."

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It appears they need a voter ID requirement and some honest people at the polling stations.  That may be asking too much of Putin's party apparatus.  When you cheat and still lose you have a real problem with the voters.