Editor’s Note: Election Watch is a regular update on the state of the 2019 races for the presidency and parliament. The country elected a new president on April 21 and will vote for a new parliament on July 21. The Election Watch project is supported by the National Endowment for Democracy. The donor doesn’t influence the content. Visit kyivpost.com for more election coverage.
Candidates are locked and loaded for the July 21 parliamentary elections.
The deadline for prospective candidates to register was June 20. But, more importantly, on the same day, the Constitutional Court issued a long-anticipated ruling, upholding the legality of the snap elections.
It dashed the hopes of parties and candidates who would have benefitted from a later election — such as the new reformist party Voice, which has scrambled to gain support so quickly, or the nearly defunct People’s Front party, which is not running after losing its support.
Others will benefit from a faster election — including polar opposites on the political spectrum, such as President Volodymyr Zelensky’s Servant of the People party and his predecessor Petro Poroshenko’s European Solidarity party.
Both are hoping to convert leftover sentiment from the presidential election into parliament seats. But Zelensky will be riding the wave of his 73-percent presidential win, while Poroshenko will try to capitalize on the despair of the dedicated 24 percent who voted for him and turn it against Zelensky.
However, polls show that the anti-Zelensky vote is split among several new parties, with Poroshenko’s European Solidarity not getting most of it.
Meanwhile, the Central Election Commission finds itself in a hurricane of litigation as controversial exiled politicians flock back to Ukraine to fight for a seat in parliament, but fail to meet the criteria for candidates.
Who’s running
Even though the window to register candidates expired on June 20, the CEC is still finalizing the list of parties and candidates running in single-member districts.
Twenty-one parties are running for parliament — fewer than in the 2014 election, when 29 parties ran. Only 10 of the parties running this year ran in the previous election, including the European Solidarity party, a rebranding of the Petro Poroshenko Bloc.
Although the Verkhovna Rada is supposed to seat 450 members, Ukrainians will be electing only 424 lawmakers. The remaining 26 districts are located in Russian-occupied Crimea and the parts of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts controlled by Russia-backed militants, they have been beyond the Ukrainian government’s control since 2014.
Out of the 424 lawmakers, 225 will be elected through party lists and 199 will be elected in single-member districts.
As of June 26, the Central Election Commission had registered 841 candidates running in these 199 single-member districts. But this number isn’t final: the commission will be adding more candidates.
The candidates aren’t evenly spread. There are districts where as few as three candidates are registered. And, in one district in Odesa, a record number of 47 candidates are running.
Who’s leading
With less than a month left until the election, new polls arrive almost daily. The new parliament will see many new faces — two out of three leading parties have refused to accept experienced politicians.
Zelensky’s party, Servant of the People, maintains a big lead. Polls show it leading with 43–45 percent of decided voters, down from its peak of 48 percent in early June.
Still, it means that the party can take 100 seats in the general vote, with however many it wins single-member districts. This also means Servant of the People will need a partner to form a ruling coalition. A minimum of 226 lawmakers is needed to form a coalition.
Zelensky’s likely coalition partner is the Voice party (Golos), another new party led by a celebrity. Its founder, singer Svyatoslav Vakarchuk, is no less recognizable than Zelensky. The party has been campaigning around Ukraine, with Vakarchuk giving free concerts — similar to Zelensky’s comedy performances — and frequenting TV talk shows.
Vakarchuk’s celebrity status and active campaigning are winning Voice third place in the polls. They are supported by 6–8 percent of decided voters. Their representatives are open to talks about forming a coalition with Zelensky’s party.
Sandwiched between these two new parties in the polls is a defiant old party. Opposition Platform — For Life is a collection of old guard politicians, almost all of whom have served in the Rada before.
The party’s main selling point is its closeness to Russia through one of its leaders, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s friend Viktor Medvedchuk. The party promises to end the war, restore friendly relations with Russia and make life more affordable.
Opposition Platform has a following of 10–11 percent. It will likely become the second-largest faction in parliament and be in opposition to the ruling coalition.
Mikheil Saakashvili speaks at a campaign event in Odesa on June 18, 2019. Saakashvili’s party, the Movement of the New Forces, has been denied registration due to a mistake in application documents. (UNIAN)
On the bubble
Other parties’ numbers vary significantly in different polls.
Yulia Tymoshenko’s Batkivshchyna party, a fixture of Ukrainian politics, has from seven- to 10-percent support, depending on the pollster. It means that, despite its leader’s massive presidential campaign, Batkivshchyna may end up with only a little bit more than the 17 lawmakers it currently has in parliament.
But that’s nothing compared to the blow that Poroshenko is facing. His European Solidarity party will wave goodbye to most of its 130 lawmakers. The party currently polls at 5 to 10 percent.
Several parties aren’t quite reaching the 5 percent threshold to get into parliament, but that can change.
Among them, Strength and Honor of ex-Security Service of Ukraine chief Ihor Smeshko has from 3 to 5 percent. However, his voters are the most disciplined; 85 percent of those supporting Smeshko said they would “definitely vote,” according to a recent poll by the Kyiv-based Rating Group.
Ex-Defense Minister Anatoly Grytsenko’s Civic Position party is unlikely to make it through. It polls at 2 to 4 percent. Even lower is Samopomich. The reformist party, which came third in the 2014 election with 10 percent of the vote, is now polling below 1 percent.
Scandal magnets
Others are engaged in a struggle for the right to run.
Leading this group is ex-Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili. The Central Election Commission turned down his party, the Movement of New Forces, after finding a discrepancy in its application.
The party’s documents said it decided to run for parliament at a party council on May 8, two weeks before the election was announced. Saakashvili’s people said it was a typographical error, and the meeting took place in June. The party went to court and won the right to run, but the CEC is appealing.
Another curious case is that of the exiled lawmaker Oleksandr Onyshchenko. He is suing to prove he lived in Ukraine for the past five years and thus meets the requirement to run for parliament. In fact, Onyshchenko fled the country in 2016 when authorities charged him with embezzlement. In Onyshchenko’s version of events, he was abroad representing Ukraine in equestrian sport championships. On June 26, the Supreme Court ruled against Onyshchenko.
But Onyshchenko may still get someone close to him in parliament. Olympic medalist rhythmic gymnast, Anna Rizatdinova, who had a child with Onyshchenko in 2017, is making her debut in politics. She is running in the Kyiv Oblast district where Onyshchenko won his seat in the previous election.
Another attempted returnee is Andriy Klyuyev, the former head of the administration of ex-President Viktor Yanukovych. Klyuyev, who fled Ukraine with his boss in February 2014, tried to register his candidacy in absentia. He was rejected. The exiled politician failed to meet the criteria, having been noticeably absent from Ukraine during the past five years.
