MOSCOW - Sergei Glaziev, one of the co-leaders of the Motherland faction in the State Duma presented 2.225 million signatures to the Central Electoral Commission (CEC) for verification some few hours before 6 pm today, which is the official deadline for the submission.

Consequently, Glaziev, a self-nominated candidate for the country’s No. 1 post, has become the fifth and last candidate to submit the 2 million signatures as required by the CEC’s rules on self-nominated candidates or those whose supporters do not have political parties’ representations in the Duma. Other candidates failed to meet the deadline, and so far now, there are seven potential candidates — incumbent president, Vladimir Putin, former SPS leader Irina Khakamada, Federation Council head Sergei Mironov, former Duma speaker and former head of Security Council Ivan Rybkin and Sergei Glaziev. Others include LDPR representative Oleg Malyshkin and Communist Party’s candidate, Nikolai Kharitonov, who are already on the ballot papers because they did not have to collect signatures because they were nominated by parties, which are currently represented in the Duma.

However, the final list of candidates to grace the ballots for the March 14, presidential election, will be known only after the CEC would’ve finished the verification processes on Feb. 8.