GROZNY, Russia — There is an election coming here in Chechnya. You can tell, because the capital is awash in campaign posters, almost all of them for one man.
"Clean Intentions, Strong Power," says one, which shows Akhmad Kadyrov wearing the classic fur hat of a Chechen clansman. Or simply, "Kadyrov, Our President."
A large poster of the former Muslim cleric even hangs above the headquarters of one of his six rivals, Nikolai Paizulayev. At first, a spokesman for the rival campaign said, it was thought that Kadyrov was going to occupy the building. When Paizulayev's team moved in, he said, "we thought we would just let it stay there."
On Chechen state television, the only candidate who has purchased advertising time is -- surprise -- Kadyrov, even though, as director Beslan Khaladov boasts, "We have the cheapest television time in Russia."
Seven men are vying to be president of Chechnya under Russian President Vladimir V. Putin's plan to end years of war and halt -- by ballots this time, instead of tanks -- the republic's stubborn ambition for independence. But the other six candidates have nothing that compares to Kadyrov's advantage. Their posters don't show them shaking Putin's hand.
The main drama in Sunday's elections, many human rights observers say, is how handily the Kremlin-appointed administrator of Chechnya will become its elected president.
Kadyrov's own press minister, Bislan Gantamirov, estimated in August that his boss, whose clandestine security force many Chechens have come to fear more than the Russian army, would get less than 5% of the vote "if people are not forced to vote for him."
Three weeks later, Gantamirov was fired and the Grozny television station he founded was surrounded by armed security forces. New polls came out showing Kadyrov would win better than half the vote.
'Theater of the Absurd'
If there were any remaining doubts, they were erased on Sept. 11, when one of Kadyrov's two serious challengers accepted a job as a Kremlin advisor, and the other was thrown out of the race by the Chechen Supreme Court.
"From that moment on, the elections -- which were a farce -- turned into a veritable theater of the absurd," said Lyudmila Alexeyeva, chairwoman of the Moscow Helsinki Group, a human rights organization that announced, along with other international organizations, that it would not monitor the polls.
