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No more opinion poll results to be published until presidential elections are over

The results that give a rough picture of the voting are announced as soon as last polling stations are closed in the country

MOSCOW, February 28 (Itar-Tass) —— No more opinion polls results, forecasts or any other statistics linked with the forthcoming presidential elections due on March 4 can be published starting from Tuesday.

Under the law, the ban is applicable not only to the mass media but also to information and communications networks of general use, including the Internet. The ban will be lifted only at 21:00 Moscow time on March 4, when the voting is over in the entire country. This is done in order not to influence voters’ decisions.

Sociologists are now getting ready to hold exit polls on the voting day. The results that give a rough picture of the voting are announced as soon as last polling stations are closed in the country.

As many as 23 public opinion survey services took part in a kind of contest to better forecast the results of the previous election campaign to the Russian State Duma lower parliament house. This time, a similar contest will be held in several categories, a source in the Russian Election Technologies Training Centre told Itar-Tass. “Till March2, sociologists are to submit their forecasts in sealed envelopes. The results will be drawn on March 5, when Russia’s Central Election Commission announces preliminary results of the voting,” the source said.

Elections of the Russian president will be held on March 4. Five candidates are vying the post. Four of these candidates were nominated by the four parliamentary parties. The candidates are Vladimir Putin of the ruling United Russia party, leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF) Gennady Zyuganov, leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) Vladimir Zhirinovsky, and self-nominated billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov.

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