The Bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko (BYuT) is planning to challenge the law on local elections under a majority-proportional system at the Constitutional Court.
"We have all grounds, as soon as the law is signed, to appeal to the Constitutional Court," the BYuT faction’s deputy chairman and prime minister of the shadow government, Serhiy Sobolev, said at a briefing in Kyiv on Tuesday, July 13.
The lawmaker said there was every possibility of challenging the law in court, despite the fact that a new chairman of the Constitutional Court has recently been appointed.
Sobolev said that the local election law contained at least four clauses contradicting the Constitution of Ukraine.
He said that the law foresaw a deviation from the fifty-fifty proportionality principle during the formation of territorial election commissions. He noted that coalition and opposition members should work in territorial election commissions.
He also said that territorial election commissions formed by coalition representatives would form district election commissions in line with the principle of proportionality.
"[But] nobody knows what the principle of proportionality means," Sobolev said.
He also noted that despite the introduction of a partial majority election system, citizens had been deprived of the right to self-nomination. He said that according to the local election law passed by parliament, only political parties have the right to nominate candidates for the post of mayors of towns and cities.
Sobolev said that the law also contained a clause foreseeing that if any of the candidates "behaves wrongly" in the elections, an electoral commission may cancel his registration.
He said that the BYuT was planning to appeal to the Council of Europe concerning the adoption of this law. In particular, the lawmakers will ask the Council of Europe to draw attention to the non-observance of a number of commitments undertaken by Ukraine, including in conducting fair and transparent elections in connection with the adoption of this law.
