MOSCOW — It wasn’t the slick video you would expect from a candidate running for president — the suit was oversized, the camera work uneasy, and the IKEA-framed family pictures too contrived — but its appearance in mid-December was a victory in itself. To stay under the radar of the Russian security services, locations had to be booked at the last minute, and the video itself was edited from hotel rooms. It was a remarkable coup. From a position of weakness, Alexei Navalny, the Kremlin’s most vocal critic, had managed to fire the starting pistol in Russia’s 2018 presidential campaign and present himself for a vacancy that no one, least of all Vladimir Putin, had advertised.
But while Navalny kicked off the long race toward the March 2018 elections, it’s unlikely he will ever be allowed a head-to-head run against Putin. Forces are already moving against him. A Moscow technology firm has closed the campaign’s crowd-funding account, apparently under pressure from state regulators. Top Kremlin figures have said they do not even consider his candidacy to be valid, citing disputed criminal convictions, which, under Russian law, would prevent him from running. Although the European Court of Human Rights has rendered a previous fraud verdict against Navalny as unlawful, that trial quickly reopened following the announcement of his candidacy. A new verdict is expected on Feb. 8, and will likely settle the matter once and for all.
