President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday during the meeting with ten newly-elected heads of regions that the past elections were so legitimate, transparent and monitored that there were no such polls in the country for a long time. The president urged participants of the meeting to establish relations with their opponents.
Vladimir Putin, speaking on changes in the political system, noted that not only parliamentary, but also non-parliamentary parties participated in the elections, and many of them achieved noticeable improvement of their positions, Kommersant writes. According to the president, this indicates that "citizens are looking for an alternative".
"The legitimacy of elections, their transparency and controllability were on such a level that, probably, was never before in our country," he noted. Other participants of the meeting also emphasized that elections were held maximally honestly.
Putin particularly paid attention to relations of the winners with their former rivals, the Kommersant notes. "I urge you to build relations not only with all your groups of support, but with all your opponents. Though they lost, "they sincerely sought to get instruments of power to settle problems of citizens", he said. There is something valuable in their programmes that can be used for joint work, Putin noted, particularly emphasizing the word "joint".
Moskovsky Komsomolets also noted that the president urged heads of regions to establish relations not only with supporters, but also with all opponents.
However, opposition mayor of Yekaterinburg Yevgeny Roizman was not invited to the president’s residence to establish relations, the newspaper adds.