Time flies by imperceptibly, and at exactly midnight on February 26, the Internet voting counter froze in its final position.
The Organizing Committee sincerely thanks all the supporters of our wonderful candidates who participated in the election of national heroes without exception. Your activity, your doubts and your criticism (this was also present), of course, will contribute to the improvement of our project.
We would like to immediately tell all the nominees whose associates did not succeed in supporting their heroes. The final figures should not upset or reassure anyone. All of you, without exception, are real heroes and illustrative examples of a responsible attitude towards the world around us. This will certainly be confirmed by the arbitrators of the Award, whose work is already nearing the final. We plan to announce the results of the painstaking and objective work of our jury on March 1, then the names and nicknames of all the Award winners will be known!
And at the moment, we state: the popular vote has been completed, and now the first laureates of the anniversary season of the International Award "My affectionate and necessary animal" have become known. Despite the stricter regulations compared to last season, the activity of the voters exceeded expectations. A total of 244,942 votes were cast in support of the nominees.
In the nomination among our lesser brothers, the winner was the cat Pilusha. A furry therapist from the Moscow region led the marathon only last week, ahead of other equally worthy contenders. And the adjective "worthy" in this case is not an empty curtsy, judging by the protocols of our arbitrators (seventeen out of twenty) that have already been received, many leaders of the second round (and not only them) will receive pleasant news at the end of the week.
In the nomination "Responsible for those", the project from St. Petersburg "Mikhalych's Cats" confidently finished. The laureate Arkady Kramarenko, judging by the critical letters that periodically arrived at the organizing committee, at first glance did not do anything special. You can agree with this, but you can also argue with it. In his spare time, throughout his adult life, a person takes care of stray animals — feeds, sterilizes, treats, and often saves them from imminent death. Agree, such asceticism is not unique in our country, but there is undoubtedly something heroic about it. And besides, Arkady Kramarenko turned out to be an excellent blogger promoting love for our younger brothers. Therefore, subscribers of the channel, having mobilized as much as possible, supported Mikhalych's Cats.
But once again, Arkady Kramarenko's confident leadership in online voting should not upset our other contenders. You are all doing one big and important thing — demonstrating to society and passing on moral principles to future generations, confirming a simple but very important truth once voiced by Mahmut Gandhi: "The degree of spiritual development of a people is determined by how these people treat animals."
Once again, congratulations to the national heroes, whom we are waiting for at the solemn ceremony of awarding the laureates of the fifth season of the first and only International Award in the world "My affectionate and necessary animal".
You can get acquainted with the results of voting for the finalists on our website by following the link.