Populist firebrand Vladimir Zhirinovsky has said his presidential campaign slogan is “Surrender.”
Zhirinovsky, leader of the ultra-right Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR), was registered as a candidate for the March 2012 presidential election on Friday.
“My campaign’s slogan is very short: ‘Surrender!’ and let bandits, bureaucrats and corrupt officials think about it,” the 65-year-old told reporters.
Zhirinovsky, the subject of endless jokes with a knack for driving his point home with a fist, said he had “only two rivals” for the presidency, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and veteran Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov.
“Zyuganov is something from the past, he'll never become president: Putin already was, and the nation has said: ‘We want change, we want a new head of state,’” he said.
LDPR garnered 12 percent in the December 4 disputed parliamentary election, which saw Putin’s United Russia party just maintain its parliamentary majority.
