Russian opposition continues with Navalny in coma

Over the years, all attempts to stop the work of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny have failed, so far.

He's been jailed repeatedly, twice gone on trial for embezzlement and fraud, been put under house arrest and had green dye thrown in his face, damaging his sight.

He was hospitalised last year for a suspected poisoning while in custody, while his brother was imprisoned for over three years on fraud charges.

Now Navalny is in an induced coma in a Berlin hospital after suffering what German authorities say was poisoning with a chemical nerve agent whilst the opposition leader and anti-corruption activist was travelling from Siberia on August 20.

The Kremlin has denied involvement and questioned whether he was poisoned at all.

Initially stunned by the attempt on his life, his supporters soon got back to work on their latest campaign against the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

His top strategist Leonid Volkov said Navalny's team put all their regular work on hold as they arranged his transfer to Germany from a hospital in Omsk, where the plane carrying him had made an emergency landing.

They publicised his plight for 48 hours, from the moment the plane landed in Omsk to the minute when the medevac plane took off with him for Berlin.

"On Sunday, when he was already in Berlin, I firmly told everyone - and everyone understood, of course - that, 'guys, I'm sorry but we need to get back to our normal work,'" Volkov said. "We've got to slog away at Smart Voting."

The Smart Voting project was launched in 2018 and is designed to oust the Kremlin's dominant United Russia party, which Navalny has dubbed "the party of crooks and thieves," from regional governments and legislators.

The project aims to identify and campaign for candidates who are most likely to beat those backed by the Kremlin in various elections.

Last year, the Smart Voting project helped opposition candidates win 20 out of 45 seats on the Moscow city council.

This year, Navalny's team hopes to use it in 31 Russian regions where elections on various levels are scheduled for September 13.

In some of those regions, the team put forward its own candidates.

Navalny, 44, has been a persistent thorn in the Kremlin's side, even though he is barred from running against Putin because of a 2017 conviction for embezzlement — a charge he says was politically motivated.

Putin refuses to even speak Navalny's name in public.

Through his two popular YouTube channels detailing government corruption, Navalny's reach has spread across his vast country.

In 2017, he set up a network of campaign offices in a bid to challenge Putin in the 2018 presidential election and despite his ban from running against Putin, Navalny kept the infrastructure in place.

These regional headquarters began their own investigations into local officials and recruited activists, some of whom would later run for office.

Navalny believes that ending the dominance of United Russia in regional parliaments and administrations will undermine "the formal mechanism" of Putin's rule.

After Navalny was hospitalised in Germany, his team ramped up promotion for Smart Voting, filling social media with calls to register on the project's online platform that tells voters which candidates to support in their area.

According to Volkov, the appeals have already increased registrations.

On Monday, they released a 40-minute expose of corruption in Novosibirsk, Siberia's largest city, where a coalition of over 30 opposition candidates is running for the city council.

The video, which has received more than 4 million views on YouTube, was shot during Navalny's fateful trip to Siberia.

Navalny stresses the importance of local elections in the video.

"Their main power is in United Russia (Putin's party) having a majority in every regional legislature and a majority in every big city council. If (United Russia) loses this majority, the power of the villains melts away immediately," he said.

From these regional roots, Navalny's team hopes to go all the way to the State Duma -- Russia's lower house of parliament -- and deploy the Smart Voting strategy in the 2021 parliamentary election.

Navalny's ability to mobilise voters next year poses a key challenge for the Kremlin, because those elections will determine who controls the State Duma in 2024.

That's when Putin's current term expires and he is expected to seek re-election, thanks to a reset of his term limits after lawmakers and voters approved changes to Russia's constitution this year.

Putin's approval ratings have fallen recently amid growing public frustration over the declining economy.

Navalny has built an organisation that goes beyond the appeal of one man.

With him imprisoned so often, his supporters are used to working on their own, as is his network of over 40 regional cells nationwide.

"Naturally, we were very worried in the following days, especially when they wouldn't let Alexei leave Omsk. But I wouldn't say it's taken a toll on our campaign because of course we are carrying on with it," said Ksenia Fadeyeva, who runs the regional headquarters in the Siberian city of Tomsk and is running for city council.

At the same time, his supporters admit that his charisma and popularity are an asset, even though his anti-corruption campaigns have angered many in power even outside the Kremlin.

Volkov admits that hardly anyone on the team has as much "political capital" or could rally people like Navalny.

"The Kremlin understands that, and it understands that with ... one horrific criminal act it can try and nullify a significant part of what we've done," he added.

But In the meantime, he says there is no other option than to continue the work.