Russia needs a "real breakthrough" to improve the life quality of its citizens and face historical challenges, President Vladimir Putin said in a televised address. He also urged his opponents to work with the Kremlin.
Image: Reuters/M. Shemetov
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Russian President Vladimir Putin thanked his voters for their "unprecedented support" after the nation's electoral body published the final tally of the presidential vote on Friday. According to the data, the Sunday election saw Putin win nearly 76.7 percent of the vote and secure another six-year term.
In a televised speech, Putin said he was "well aware" of the problems facing Russian citizens, including dropping incomes, gaps in health care provision, and issues with housing and utilities.
"We need a real breakthrough," he said. "I understand my colossal responsibility to Russian citizens, to the country."
"What we need is consequential, deep-seated change, thought-out moves that bring about steady positive results," Putin added.
The Russian president, who has been the nation's most powerful politician since 2000, pledged to create more jobs, fight poverty, develop infrastructure and education, as well as boost the development of "cities and villages."
"All of this will be based on a mighty leap in technology which we are about to make," Putin said, without providing details.
Sunday's election saw Putin score an easy victory against his competitors, with the runner-up, Pavel Grudinin of the Communist Party, winning less than 12 percent of the vote and the ultranationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky placing third with 5.65 percent. Putin's best-known pro-Western rival, Alexei Navalny, was barred from running over a fraud case. The young opposition leader claims the charges had been trumped-up.
Vladimir Putin: The road to power
Vladimir Putin has just been elected to a fourth term. A look at the Russian president's rise from low-level KGB agent to unstoppable political force — by whatever means necessary.
Image: picture-alliance/Russian Look
KGB cadet
Born in St.Petersburg in 1952, Putin signed up with the Soviet intelligence agency the KGB right out of law school in 1975. His first assignment was to monitor foreign nationals and consulate employees in his home city, then called Leningrad. He was then assigned to Dresden, East Germany. He reportedly burned hundreds of KGB files after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Putin was one of the deputies to St Petersburg Mayor Anatoly Sobchak from 1991 to 1996. Sobchak met Putin at Leningrad State University and the two men were close until Sobchak's death in 2000. Despite accusations of corruption, Sobchak was never charged.
Image: Imago/ITAR-TASS
Meteoric rise
Putin quickly leapt from St.Petersburg to Moscow. In 1997, President Boris Yeltsin gave Putin a mid-level position on his staff — a position Putin would use to cultivate important political friendships that would serve him in the decades to come.
Image: picture alliance/AP Images
Death of a friend
Putin was deeply affected by Anatoly Sobchak's death in 2000. After the apprentice outstripped his teacher politically, Sobchak became a vocal early proponent of Putin's bid for the presidency. A year earlier, Putin used his political connections to have fraud allegations against Sobchak dropped, the beginning of a pattern for friends of the former spy.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/S. Chirikov
Temporary president
In June 2000, Boris Yeltsin stepped down, leaving his prime minister to become interim leader. As he was running for his successful presidential campaign, corruption allegations from his time on the city government in St.Petersburg resurfaced. Marina Salye, the lawmaker who brought up the claims, was silenced and forced to leave the city.
Image: Imago/ITAR-TASS
Tandemocracy
When Putin was constitutionally barred from running for a third consecutive term in 2008, his Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev ran in his stead. When Medvedev was elected, he appointed Putin as premier. This led to criticism of a "tandemocracy," in Moscow, with many people believing that Medvedev was Putin's puppet.
Image: Imago/ITAR-TASS
Victory
In March 2018, Vladimir Putin was elected to his fourth term as president. Because the presidential term has been extended, this means Putin will be in power for the next six years. However, the election was marred by a lack of opposition to the incumbent, as well as allegations of vote tampering and ballot-stuffing.
Image: Reuters/D. Mdzinarishvili
Putin pushes for constitutional reform
Less than two years after his latest election victory, Putin unexpectedly announced sweeping constitutional changes that prompted his most loyal ally, Dmitry Medvedev, to resign. He was replaced by little-known Mikhail Mishustin (R). Soon after that, Putin hinted he was willing to run again when his current term expires in 2024.
Image: picture-alliance/Russian Look
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Putin urged his political opponents to cooperate with his efforts to improve Russia, saying that the move needed to have a "nationwide character and unite everyone."
"Yes, criticisms, arguments, discussions are necessary, but there should be no place for irresponsible populism," he said. "The main orientation point for everyone, today most of all, should be in the national interest and for the benefit of the people."
He added that he respected the voters who did not support him, but emphasized that "political preferences should not divide us."
"We are all patriots of our country," he said.
Vladimir Putin came to power as a successor to Russia's first post-Soviet president, Boris Yeltsin. He has effectively remained the most powerful man in Russia since, including his stint as prime minister between 2008 and 2012. His most recent election success makes him the longest-serving Russian ruler since Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.
