When Ukrainians go to the polls this Sunday, an unprecedented number of international observers will monitor the vote.
It will be the largest
observation mission anywhere in the history of the Office for Democratic
Institutions and Human Rights, an arm of the 57-nation Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Some 1,250 people comprise
the May 25 observation mission of Ukraine’s presidential election, including
100 long-term observers and just fewer than 900 short-term observers.
In a May 23
interview with Kyiv Post, Tana de Zulueta, a former Italian parliamentarian who
heads the mission, described the observers as a diverse bunch by nationality,
with notably large contingents coming from Canada, the United States and the
European Union. There will, however, be one country with a notable absence from
Sunday’s mission.
“There are no long-term or short-term Russian
observers on this mission. That was the choice of the Russian Federation. The
mission was organized at the height of the Crimea crisis,” said de Zulueta, “It
will be the first time that an election is observed by ODIHR without Russian
observers.”
Yet despite
this absence, on Friday de Zulueta said the Russian chargé d’affaires communicated
his country supported the election and believes that the observation mission
should be able to go ahead.
De Zulueta says that these remarks, which echo
similar statements this week by Putin, mark a dramatic reversal in Russia’s
earlier position, which de Zulueta called regrettable, that the elections were
illegitimate. “They even hinted that they might participate in the second round
of the elections, if there is a second round.”
Electoral improvements
This is the 10th time ODIHR has observed elections in Ukraine.
In 2010, the observation
mission to Ukraine’s previous election noted “significant progress,” and
concluded that Ukraine had met most of its commitments to the OSCE and the
Council of Europe. It was less pleased
with subsequent parliamentary elections conducted under the Yanukovych
administration. Nevertheless, in terms
of procedure, de Zulueta suggests that of the familiar problems of Ukrainian
democracy have disappeared this time:
“We haven’t
been told, by stakeholders and by local observers about any problems regarding
the misuse of administrative resources, which was a national tradition. We
haven’t heard any allegations of vote buying. The use of so-called technical
candidates, selling their services by having members on the election commission
– there may be supply, but there’s no demand. There isn’t the money out there
to hire their services, so in fact they’ve had difficulty filling those
positions.”
In this unusually
short election cycle, Peter Poroshenko spent around $7.38 million, Serhiy
Tihipko spent $5.6 million, and Yulia Tymoshenko spent $3.43 million.
Around 80
percent of this funding has gone to television advertisements, according to
data from CHESNO. By comparison, previous presidential campaign spending passed
the $1 billion mark in total during the hard-fought 2010 election, according to
the Voter’s Committee of Ukraine.
De Zulueta,
who has been monitoring elections since the 1990s, also cites progress on the
part of Ukraine’s Central Election Commission, which she described as open and
transparent in dealing with international observers.
She says has not been the case in the past. She
suggests that part of this may be thanks to the work of previous observation missions,
citing projects led by the OSCE and the Council of Europe and a recent tranche
of election reform laws, which she says followed recommendations made by ODIHR.
“I’ve never been in a country where the footprint of the ODIHR is as visible as
in Ukraine.”
“There
really does appear to have been improvements, there’s no doubt about it,” said
de Zulueta. “But then we have this looming cloud in the east.”
Observation in Ukraine’s east
The mission
won’t decide on whether it will send observers to Donbas until Saturday
morning. Ukraine’s Central Election
Commission has already communicated to the mission that there will be no voting
held in the southern regions of Luhansk, because they cannot deliver voting
materials. The decision will be based on the analysis of security teams and
long-term observers stationed in the Eastern regions and in Kyiv, said Thomas
Rhymer, an ODIHR spokesperson.
“We can’t
send every observer with a body guard, and each team with a humvee,” said
Rhymer. “Any place that law enforcement is unable to guarantee security, where
the military active in security operations, we will not send observers.”
In Luhansk,
the chances for free voting in the election looks poor, while in Donetsk, the
mission hopes to have some voting stations available either in the town itself
or in nearby safe areas toward the region’s western border.
“In
Donetsk, they may be quarreling amongst themselves, but there is an environment
that has enabled [Ukraine’s CEC] to hope that they can actually relocate some
district election commissions, to ensure some degree of voting,” said de
Zulueta. “However, the police are not collaborating. The Donetsk Republic
people have made repeated visits to all the election commissions telling them
not to operate the vote.”
There is
speculation that low turnout in Ukraine’s troubled eastern regions could be
used to question the results of the election.
“We’ve been
asked, would we then be able to call it a legitimate election? We’re not in the
business of legitimating elections, we report on the process,” said de Zulueta.
If that process includes the impossibility of voting for a substantial
percentage of the population, the mission head says it will be noted – the
right to vote is a central OSCE commitment. “But there again, who will have
been to blame? Those who forcibly prevented voters, not those who tried to
enable them.”
The efforts
of local election staff in Ukraine’s insurgent Eastern regions is, according to
de Zulueta, gallant in no uncertain terms. “Naturally, you can’t hold an
election at your kitchen table, but they have been meeting to organize in
apartments, they have been hiding ballots and other sensitive materials.”
Such
attempts to secure polling places have continued in face of widespread armed
intimidation across all of the voting locations in Donbas, including the
abduction, for a several hours, of a regional head of the voting commission.
Still, if
the east is significantly excluded, ODIHR officials seem unsure how it will
affect their assessment. The feeling at the mission parallels that of many
Ukrainians, anxious to see the country move on to the hard work of rebuilding
democratic institutions after several months of nearly constant crisis. How and
when Ukraine can move on is still unknown.
“What could our recommendations be? Next time,
don’t have an insurgency?” said Rhymer.
William Schreiber is a Coca-Cola World Fellow
at Yale University.
