KEY POINTS:
The campaign was drearily insipid; the result a foregone conclusion.
Ever since Vladimir Putin announced last December that he was backing Dmitry Medvedev, Russia's First Deputy Prime Minister, to be the next President, the Kremlin has been using its vast resources to make this happy scenario come true.
Medvedev swiftly offered Putin the job of Prime Minister. Millions of public sector workers were told to vote for Medvedev or lose their jobs. Zealous election functionaries were expected to stuff ballot boxes to ensure he won a landslide victory.
And so he did: Medvedev gained 70.23 per cent of the vote, with his nearest challenger, Communist Gennady Zyuganov, back on 17.76 per cent. Turnout was 69.65 per cent.
The same tactic was used in Russia's rigged parliamentary elections in December, which saw some areas, most notably Chechnya, deliver a 99 per cent vote for Putin's United Russia party. Turnout was an equally improbable 99.6 per cent.
Fraudulent elections have now become an established part of Russian political life - in the words of the Soviet dissident Sergei Kovalev a "tasteless farce being played out by untalented directors on the entire, boundless Russian stage".
But many Russians will have voted willingly for Medvedev, believing him to be decent, competent and even cuddly. Nobody is in any doubt that the 42-year-old lawyer from St Petersburg has the only attribute that matters: Putin's trust.
Medvedev is the youngest Russian leader since Tsar Nicholas II.
Showing off the double act that will be at the helm of the vast, nuclear-armed country, Medvedev and Putin walked side by side out of the Kremlin gates and climbed on to the stage at a victory concert on Red Square.
Medvedev said his presidency would be a "direct continuation" of Putin's eight years in office.
The outgoing President, barred by term limits from running, will move down the Moskva River to the White House to take up his Prime Minister's job after Medvedev has been sworn in.
In the run-up to the poll, Kremlin spin-doctors have portrayed Medvedev as a representative of Russia's new and aspiring middle class: a modest, internet-savvy, cosmopolitan leader who holidays on the Black Sea and likes the veteran British rock band Deep Purple. Like his friend and mentor Putin, Medvedev grew up in Leningrad, Russia's most European city, now St Petersburg. In an interview with the magazine Itogi, Medvedev spoke lyrically of his ordinary childhood. His parents were university teachers.
Medvedev and his wife, Svetlana, were teenage sweethearts; their son, Ilya, was born in 1996. He worked as a labourer and a snow-sweeper while studying law at Leningrad State University, where he took a PhD. In 1991 he met Putin when both worked for St Petersburg's mayor.
But Medvedev's real personality is a mystery. Observers agree that, having survived the shark-pool of Kremlin politics, first as Putin's campaign manager for the 2000 presidential elections and then as his chief of staff, he is no patsy. He became First Deputy Prime Minister in 2005. His job is to oversee health, education and agriculture - all in bad shape.
The questions now are how will Medvedev and Putin work together? Who will dominate? Does Medvedev have a post-Putin agenda? Political analysts find it tough to explain how Russia will function from May 7, when Medvedev becomes the Federation's third post-Soviet leader. They have used words such as tandem, diarchy and dualism - all alien to Russia, which has traditionally relied on a single autocrat.
"Decisions will be made in a tandem behind closed doors," Boris Makarenko, deputy director of the Centre for Political Technologies, Russia's oldest independent think-tank, said. "We can only guess how these decisions will be made."
Some have compared Putin's future role to that of St Sergius, a 14th-century saint and monastic reformer who advised Prince Dmitry Donskoy on how to beat the Mongols.
Most observers believe Putin will remain the dominant figure in politics, possibly returning as President in 2012. Others think Putin is tired and does not really want to head the new Government - aware that his popularity could rapidly vanish as the country's multiple economic problems (inflation, liquidity) pile up.
Most experts believe Russia's belligerent attitude to the West in the late Putin era is unlikely to change soon.
"Medvedev will be the same as Putin, but with a more smiley face. The distribution of powers between the two will be so complex it would be suicidal to pursue a different agenda," Grigorii Golosov, a professor of political sciences at St Petersburg's European University, said.
Asked whether Medvedev had a world view of his own, he said: "Who knows? At the moment he doesn't say. Any differences with Putin are stylistic, not substantive."
A few optimists believe that Medvedev could be progressive, and might even unravel Putinism.
In a speech last month in Krasnoyarsk, Medvedev said Russia desperately needed an independent judiciary and a free press. "Freedom is better than non-freedom," he said. He also called for economic reforms and an end to bureaucratic corruption.
What is not clear is whether he means what he says or whether this is merely a Putin-approved ploy to assuage an international community weary of Putin's West-bashing.
"I think there is a 50/50 chance Medvedev could turn into a real progressive leader," Andrei Ryabov, an expert in politics at the Carnegie Centre in Moscow, said. "It depends on Medvedev's political will. It's like in France under the Fifth Republic, back in the Sixties, when Charles de Gaulle ran an authoritarian regime. But his successors using the same constitution were very different."
POWER SPLIT
President
* Head of state.
* Office is in the Kremlin.
* Commander-in-chief of armed forces - in charge of Russia's nuclear weapons.
* Sets direction of foreign and domestic policies.
* Guarantor of the constitution, citizens' rights.
* Defender of Russia's sovereignty.
* Prime Minister reports directly to the President.
* Appoints and sacks PM and other federal ministers, subject to parliamentary approval.
* All Russian spy services report directly to the President.
* Foreign Ministry, Defence Ministry, Interior Ministry, Emergency Ministry, Justice Ministry report directly to President.
* Controls the Presidential Administration, based in the Kremlin.
* Has a right to chair Cabinet meetings, but normally leaves this to the Prime Minister.
* Controls and appoints the Security Council, which oversees Russia's defence and security policies.
* Appoints central bank head.
* Can call a state of emergency or impose martial law if he believes there is a threat to national security.
Prime Minister
* Heads Cabinet of ministers.
* Office located in Moscow's White House, across the city from the Kremlin.
* Becomes acting president if the President "is incapacitatedand cannot fulfil his responsibilities", according to Russia's Constitution.
* Civilian ministries such as education and health report to the Prime Minister.
* Implements domestic and foreign policy as well as presidential decrees, laws and international agreements.
* Co-ordinates economic and fiscal policy, manages federal property.
* Sets prices for gas, electricity and domestic transport.
* Controls social policy, labour policy, migration and family policies.
- OBSERVER, additional reporting Reuters
