Polling stations for voting at the early parliamentary elections in Ukraine opened early on Sunday, Oct. 26. Ukrainians are coming to elect new parliament.
The polling stations will be open from 8 a.m. until 8 p.m. on Oct. 26.
These elections are conducted based on a mixed-member proportional representation. According to the law, 225 MPs will be elected on party lists and 225 in single-member constituencies. However, given that the elections won’t be held at 12 single-seat constituencies in Crimea and Sevastopol, as well as at 15 constituencies in Donetsk and Luhansk regions, at most 423 MPs out of 450 will be elected.
At the same time, Ukrainian citizens living in Crimea and Sevastopol will be able to vote for candidates on party tickets by a simplified procedure on mainland Ukraine. The same procedure applies to the residents of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, who unlike citizens from other regions don’t have to show documents confirming the necessity to vote outside their residential area.
Excluding Crimea and Sevastopol, there are 33.57 million voters in Ukraine, including 3.3 million in Donetsk region and 1.77 million in Luhansk region, as well as 496,000 voters abroad.
A total of 213 election constituencies were created in Ukraine, excluding Crimea and Sevastopol. These include 32,000 polling stations in Ukraine and 112 abroad. The largest number of stations were set up in Russia (6), Germany (5); the U.S. (4), Poland (4) and Italy (4).
The elections will be held in 17 out of 32 constituencies in Luhansk and Donetsk regions. However, the elections in these regions will be held only on the territories controlled by Ukrainian authorities. According to the Central Election Commission (CEC), the elections can be held in twelve constituencies of Donetsk region and five constituencies of Luhansk region.
According to Opora civil network, a total of 2.8 million out of 5.07 million voters in Donetsk and Luhansk regions won’t be able to vote.
According to the CEC, a total of 190,300 Ukrainians applied for changing their polling stations, including 21,700 people from Donetsk region, 11,100 from Luhansk region and 3,600 from Crimea and Sevastopol.
In addition, the issue of voting for the soldiers in the anti-terrorist operation zone remains unresolved, as the majority of soldiers have only military registration cards on them. According to the law, a voter must show a passport of Ukrainian citizen to get a voting bulletin.
The Central Election Commission (CEC) has registered lists of candidates to lawmakers at the extraordinary parliamentary election of a total of 29 parties. According to opinion polls, the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko leads the parliamentary election race in Ukraine. Other parties which have a chance of passing the minimum 5 percent-vote threshold include the People’s Front lead by Arseniy Yatsenyuk, the Radical Party of Ukraine led by Oleh Liashko, and the Batkivschyna All-Ukrainian Union lead by Yulia Tymoshenko.
According to different surveys, Anatoliy Hrytsenko’s Civil Position Party, the Samopomich Union led by Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovy, the Strong Ukraine led by Sergiy Tigipko and the Opposition Bloc also have a chance to get seats in parliament.
A total of 1,300 candidates nominated by parties have been registered as candidates to MPs in single-member constituencies, as well as 2,010 self-nominees.
The Central Election Commission is to release the official results of the voting by Nov. 10, inclusive. No minimum voter turnout is required for the parliamentary elections to be valid.
