The 2008 presidential campaign of Dmitry Medvedev was the successful campaign of Dmitry Medvedev in the

2008 Russian presidential election Presidential elections were held in Russia on 2 March 2008, and resulted in the election of Dmitry Medvedev as the third President of Russia. Medvedev was elected for a four-year term, whose candidacy was supported by incumbent president Vladim ...

Background

Vladimir Putin Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin; (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who holds the office of president of Russia. Putin has served continuously as president or prime minister since 1999: as prime min ...

was constitutionally ineligible to run for a third-consecutive term in 2008. A popular figure in Russia, speculation rested on whom Putin might tap to be his "chosen successor". In September 2007 Putin dismissed Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov, who had previously been speculated as a potential successor to him. He then appointed

Viktor Zubkov Viktor Alekseyevich Zubkov ( rus, Ви́ктор Алексе́евич Зубко́в, p=ˈvʲiktər ɐlʲɪˈksʲejɪvʲɪtɕ zʊpˈkof; born 15 September 1941) is a Russian civil servant, politician and businessman who served as the 36th Pr ...

to replace Fradkov as Prime Minister, igniting immediate speculation that Putin was grooming Zubkov to serve as his presidential successor. On October 1, 2007, Putin announced that he would run for parliament at the head of

United Russia United Russia ( rus, Единая Россия, Yedinaya Rossiya, (j)ɪˈdʲinəjə rɐˈsʲijə) is a Russian conservative political party. As the largest party in Russia, it holds 325 (or 72.22%) of the 450 seats in the State Duma , havin ...

's ticket in the 2007 legislative election.

Campaign

On December 10, 2007, roughly a week after United Russia handily won the legislative election, Putin announced that his hand-picked candidate to succeed him as president would be Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. The following day Medvedev announced that, if elected president, he would nominate Putin to serve as his Prime Minister. Soon after Putin tapped Medvedev as his chosen successor, the leaders of

A Just Russia A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes' ...

, Civic Force, and the Agrarian Party of Russia all affirmed their support of Medvedev's candidacy. Medvedev ultimately prevailed in the election facing no strong challenge.

References

{{Candidates in the Russian presidential election, 2008 campaign 2012 Medvedev