Zelenka, elections, war: why green antiseptic ended up in the ballot box?

Zelenka, or "brilliant green," is a common antiseptic in some Eastern European countries. Zelenka is often used for cuts or other skin injuries to prevent infection. Bottles of this liquid can be found in almost every Russian household. However, the use of zelenka is not limited to medical purposes... 

One of the peculiarities of zelenka is its persistence; applied to skin or clothing, the solution is not easy to wash off. You can even find advice on the internet on how to remove its green staining from clothes or skin using home remedies. Therefore, it is not surprising that zelenka is used to attack civil activistsla Ulitskaya, popular blogger Ilya Varlamov, and other prominent figures have been doused with the liquid. Alexei Navalny also suffered from the antiseptic and was even temporarily blinded due to zelenka getting into his eyes. 

Zelenka found its application in the recent presidential elections as well. Some voters brought green liquid to the polling stations and poured it into the ballot box. Such actions lead to the spoilage of all the ballots in the box and make it impossible to count them in the voting results. In some cases, the liquid was poured onto voter lists - books containing information about citizens entitled to vote at a specific polling station. 

Interestingly, in the context of elections, the green attacks targeted not individual persons, such as members of election commissions, representatives of candidates, or the candidates themselves. Pouring zelenka into the ballot box symbolically expresses one's attitude toward the entire voting procedure. When a person spoils their own ballot, they are in effect using the ‘against all’ option, thus showing their attitude toward the candidates (there is no “against all” option in the Russian elections since 2006). Mass spoilage of others' ballots shows not so much the attitude toward the candidates but rather the voter's attitude toward the entire election procedure. Mass ballot spoilage, therefore, is a message about the illegitimacy of the entire electoral process. 

Indirect confirmation of this is the swift reaction to the phenomenon from the state apparatus. The Chairperson of the Central Election Commission (CEC) stated that voters spoiled the ballot boxes for a reward. Members of the State Duma spoke about the need to tighten penalties under the article on obstructing the exercise of citizens' electoral rights (Article 141 of the Criminal Code). Even after the voting results were announced, the president condemned the spoiling of ballots. The swift reaction of the state apparatus demonstrated that mass ballot spoilage calls into question the legitimacy of the entire procedure.

Ballot box spoilage did not become neither a widespread nor a negligible event (the CEC reported 30 ‘green’ cases). However, it cannot be unequivocally stated that the movement was initiated from below. Such an interpretation is very attractive because it allows us to say that citizens did not want “to play cards with a cheater” and decided to show their attitude toward the procedure. But there have been reports that citizens have fallen victim to telephone scammers. For example, witnesses of one of the episodes claimed that the person pouring zelenka into the ballot box “received instructions” over the phone. In another case, the callers persuaded the girl to use liquid to prevent her personal data from falling into the hands of pro-Ukrainian supporters who were allegedly polling station members. Similar conversations may have taken place on other occasions, although there is no definitive evidence in this regard. It should be noted that since the start of full-scale invasion, telephone fraud has become one of the tools of war (link 1, 2 and 3).

Perhaps it is still too early to draw unequivocal conclusions about what was the definitive reason for zelenka ending up in the ballot boxes – grassroots citizen movement or telephone fraud. One of the possible indicators will be the development of jurisprudence in cases of citizens pouring zelenka into the ballot box. If the courts impose minimal penalties for these actions or apply provisions of the Administrative Code (for example, one of the voters was held administratively liable for disobeying a lawful demand of a police officer), then most likely it will mean recognition of foreign intervention. Opponents of the government, guided by their own ideals and principles, as recent political cases show, do not deserve leniency in the regime's view.