Leaders are leading?

by Mike

Landslide victories and rejections of a would-be dictatorship dominated the political news this weekend. It is hard to say whether the public in the “free world” should be able to criticise those who we look upon as ruling with an iron fist, when our leaders tend to do exactly the same thing but in a more romanticised way.

Vladimir Putin’s party scored a landslide win in Russia’s election with reaction being widespread contempt from those who were not even allowed to stand in the polls. Former chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov called it “a farce, they’re not just rigging the vote. They’re raping the democratic system.”

Kasparov’s Other Russia group was banned from standing and many opposition rallies in Moscow and St Petersburg were broken up by the police. The same opposition parties cannot get any television coverage to build up their election promises.

State workers were apparently told to vote Putin or be sacked and there were claims hospital patients faced having treatment withdrawn if they did not mark their papers the “right way”. It all adds up to disturbing news and the fear of the old USSR seems very prominent once more.

The White House wants the claims of corruption in the elections to be investigated but it is a safe bet to suggest there is little chance of this happening. Vladimir Putin’s reputation as a threat to democracy has been under scrutiny before and next few years could be a dangerous time, one which we hope will not result in war.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez also had an important weekend but results did not go his way. Voters said “No” to reforms that would have scrapped term limits on Chavez’s rule, given him control over foreign currency reserves and boosted his powers to expropriate private property.

The public lined up against Chavez for what they believe to be constitutional reforms in order to set up a dictatorship. Chavez has previously stated that he wants to ‘rule until he dies’ but that dream may now have to die in 2013 if he is unable to pass his reforms.

The world is becoming a stranger place by the minute.

Monday, December 3rd, 2007 and is filed under Thoughts & Questions, Views on News.