Corruption is rife. Political allegiances change fast enough to make voters and pundits’ heads spin. The figures dominating the political landscape are familiar.  The “Big Three” of Ukrainian politics, President Viktor Yanukovych, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov and the figurehead of the United Opposition coalition, imprisoned ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, are all pre-2004 veterans. All have dirty hands.

The Melnychenko tapes – the hundreds of hours of audiotapes allegedly recorded by ex-President Leonid Kuchma’s bodyguard Mykola Melnychenko – purportedly exposed Azarov as using his position then as head of the State and Tax Administration to pressure officials, ensuring Kuchma’s re-election in 1999. Azarov and Kuchma have consistently denied those and other allegations stemming from the disputed Melnychenko tapes made in 1999-2000.

Tymoshenko, who made her fortune in the murky gas-trading world of the 1990s, leads the opposition Batkivschyna Party, from behind bars. Although undoubtedly no angel, her incarceration is believed in the West to be politically motivated revenge by President Viktor Yanukovych, a charge that he denies.

The Western preoccupation with labeling Ukrainian politicians as “pro-Kremlin” or “pro-Europe” is misplaced. Mostly, Ukrainian politicians are “pro” themselves.

A recent report, by independent electoral monitoring body Canada Mission, found that media repression, procedural irregularities, direct and indirect vote buying were widespread.

The Razumkov Center think tank reports that the average Ukrainian vote can be bought for just €250. This finding is unsurprising in a country where endemic corruption devalues the vote, and the average monthly wage is €300.

Press freedom in Ukraine has declined rapidly since Yanukovych took office in 2010. The country’s media is now only “partly free” according to U.S.-based Freedom House, a return to the pre-2004 rating. While the government claim 96 percent of media are independent, in reality Yanukovych-friendly oligarchs control most television networks. The most prominent example of this prevalent cronyism is Deputy Prime Minister Valery Khoroshkovskiy. One of Ukraine’s richest businessmen, he holds majority shares in top Ukrainian television channels.

Ukraine’s main independent press monitoring body, the Institute of Mass Information, reports largely undetectable self-censorship is endemic at every level of journalism. Payment for positive media coverage has recently been exposed as a standard practice in election campaigns.

Amidst the circus show that passes for politics in Ukraine, a new generation of celebrity politicians has emerged. Authors, journalists, and footballers are all trying their hand at politics. Celebrity status presumably allows the first hurdle of securing media coverage to be sidestepped.

The most formidable of this new breed is heavyweight boxing champion Vitali Klitschko. His party, Ukrainian Democratic Alliance for Reform has vowed to fight endemic corruption.

Recent polls put UDAR ahead of United Opposition, and in second place behind the ruling Party of Regions. Klitschko has ruled out collaboration with the incumbent Regions Party. However, nothing is ever certain in Ukrainian politics.

On Oct. 15, opposition forces UDAR and Batkivschyna announced a mutual agreement to withdraw, respectively, 32 and 26 candidates from the electoral race in regions where the opposition vote could be detrimentally split. Such measures are partly necessary due to changes in the electoral system. According independent political analysts, the new system increases the likelihood of re-election for the incumbent government.

The deal certainly increases UDAR’s chance of winning. It also smacks of a “if-you-can’t-beat-them-join them” philosophy. Certainly, backroom deals run to contrary to Klitschko’s stated ideal of making politics more open.

If they do get into parliament, UDAR lawmakers are likely to be sharing power with their United Opposition allies, many of whom have tainted pasts or extremist views. Navigating the culture of corruption will test UDAR’s moral grounding. Navigating the practicalities of power sharing and the complex bureaucratic system will test their capacity to transform rhetoric into something meaningful. Amnesty International recently criticized all political parties for failing to put forward proposals to investigate and punish endemic police criminality.

The road ahead is a rocky one for Klitschko and crew, but they may be Ukraine’s best hope. Klitschko must maintain a squeaky clean image to run again on an anti-corruption platform in the 2015 presidential election. That’s a tall order in such a dirty environment. Ukrainian politics is a much rougher sport than boxing. There are few rules in this game.

Harriet Salem is a freelance journalist based in Belgrade, Serbia. She also works in association with an international independent media resource Kiev Collective. She can be reached at [email protected], www.harrietsalem.com.