1996 Russian presidential election

Russian presidential election, 1996

1991 (Russian SFSR) ← 16 June 1996 (first round) 3 July 1996 (second round) → 2000

Turnout 69.7% 5 pp (first round) 68.8% 0.9 pp (second round)   Nominee Boris Yeltsin Gennady Zyuganov Party Independent Communist Party Home state Sverdlovsk Oblast Oryol Oblast Popular vote 40,203,948 30,102,288 Percentage 54.4% 40.7%

Regions in which the second round of elections won by Boris Yeltsin   Regions in which the second round of elections won by Gennady Zyuganov

President before election Boris Yeltsin Independent Elected President Boris Yeltsin Independent

Boris Yeltsin
Independent

Boris Yeltsin
Independent

Presidential elections were held in Russia on 16 June 1996, with a second round on 3 July. The result was a victory for the incumbent President Boris Yeltsin, who ran as an independent. Yeltsin defeated Communist challenger Gennady Zyuganov in the run-off, receiving 54.4% of the vote. His inauguration ceremony took place on 9 August. There have been claims that the election was fraudulent, favoring Yeltsin.

Following December 1995, the Communist Party of Russian Federation had achieved dominance in the Duma. On 9 January 1996, Chechen rebels seized thousands of hostages in Dagestan, and Yeltsin's response was viewed as a failure. The Russian economy was still contracting and many workers had been unpaid for months.

President Yeltsin's public opinion was at a historical low point, a fifth place among presidential candidates, with only 8 percent support, while Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov was in the lead with 21 percent. When Zyuganov showed up at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in February 1996, Western leaders lined up to meet him. Major world media treated him as the likely next president of Russia.