Elections in Ukraine
 |
|---|
 Ukraine portal |
Elections in Ukraineare held to choose thepresident(head of state),Verkhovna Rada(legislature), andlocal governments.Referendumsmay be held on special occasions. Ukraine has amulti-party system,with numerouspartiesin which often not a single party has a chance of gaining power alone, andpartiesmust work with each other to formcoalition governments.
Legislation[edit]
Elections in Ukraine are held to choose thePresident(head of state) andVerkhovna Rada(legislature). TheUkrainian constitutiondoes not allow to hold elections toVerkhovna Radawhile martial law is in effect, while allowing for presidential elections.[1]The president is elected for a five-year term. The Verkhovna Rada has 450 members and is also elected for a five-year term, but may be dissolved earlier by the president in the case of a failure to form a government.[2][3][4]The next election to the Verkhovna Rada,set to be in 2023,[5]will be, for the first time, with different regionalopen lists(with again anelectoral thresholdof five percent) and a return, and thus abolition of theconstituencieswithfirst-past-the-post voting,to only one national constituency.[6]
From2012until the2019 Ukrainian parliamentary electionthe Verkhovna Rada was elected using amixed election system.Half of the representatives were elected from nationalclosed party listsdistributed between the parties using theHare quotawith a 5% threshold. The remaining half were elected fromconstituenciesusingfirst-past-the-post voting.This system was adopted for the2012 elections[2][7]and was also used for the2014 election,as a new draft law moving to electing all members usingopen party listsfailed to gather necessary support in the Rada.[8]According to current law, thenext election to the Verkhovna Rada (to be held) in 2023[5]will againbe without single-member constituencies and instead deputies can only be elected on a party list in one nationwide constituency with a 5%election thresholdwithopenregional lists of candidates for deputies.[6]
Asnap pollmust have avoter turnouthigher than 50%.[9]
Ukraine's election law forbids outside financing of political parties or campaigns.[10]
Presidential candidates must have had residence in Ukraine for the past ten years prior to election day.[11]
Since late February 2016 a party congress is allowed to remove any candidate from its party list before the Central Election Commission recognizes him or her elected. Meaning that parties after elections can prevent their candidates to take a seat in parliament that they were entitled to due to their place on the party list.[12]A party is (since late February 2016) also allowed to excluded people from its electoral list of the last parliamentary elections.[13]
In Ukraine political campaigning outside election campaign periods is prohibited.[14]But this prohibition is widely ignored in election years and perpetraters are seldom punished since political parties use loopholes in election law.[14]
Local elections[edit]
Under theConstitution of Ukraine,the term of office of the heads of villages and towns and the council members of these villages and towns is five years.[15]
Past legislation[edit]
The parliamentary election law has been changed four times from 1991 to 2015.[2][16]Before 1998 all the members of the Parliament were elected by single-seatconstituencies(from each electoral district). In 1998 and in 2002 half of the members were elected byproportional representation(faction vote) and the other half by single-seat constituencies. In the2006and2007 parliamentary election,all 450 members of the Verkhovna Rada were elected byparty-list proportional representationwithclosed lists[17][18][19](the same goes for local elections).[20]
In the2010 Ukrainian local electionsfour years was set for the office of the heads of villages and towns and the council members of these villages and towns.[15][21]
Voting patterns[edit]
Since thedissolution of the Soviet Union,theCommunist Party of Ukrainepolitically dominated most of Ukraine. By mid 1990s the communists completely lost popularity in western Ukraine, which voted for any representative but communist. SinceLeonid Kuchmaleft presidential post, in 2004 support for the Communist Party shifted towards theParty of Regionsbeing politically dominating mostly over the southeastern Ukraine. At the same time initially led by thePeople's Movement of Ukraine,political leadership in the non-communist camp was taken over byOur Ukrainebloc andBloc of Yulia Tymoshenko.
In the elections since 2002 voters of Western and Central Ukrainian oblasts voted mostly for parties (Our Ukraine,Batkivshchyna,UDAR,Self Reliance,Radical Party,Petro Poroshenko Blocand thePeople's Front) and presidential candidates (Viktor Yushchenko,Yulia Tymoshenko) with a pro-Western and state reformplatform,while voters in Southern and Eastern oblasts of Ukraine voted for parties (CPU,Party of RegionsandOpposition Bloc) and presidential candidates (Viktor Yanukovych) with a pro-Russian andstatus quoplatform.[22][23][24][25][26][27]Although this geographical division is decreasing.[28][22][29]Till the2014 Ukrainian parliamentary electionthe electorate of CPU and Party of Regions was very loyal to them.[26]But in the 2014 parliamentary election Party of Regions did not to participate (because of a perceived lack of legitimacy (of the election), because not every resident of theDonbascould vote) and the CPU came 1.12% short of the 5% election threshold.[30][31]The results were a victory for the pro-Western parties and a major defeat for the pro-Russian camp.
A 2010 study by the Institute of Social and Political Psychology of Ukraine found that in general, Yulia Tymoshenko supporters are more optimistic compared with Viktor Yanukovych supporters. 46 percent of the Tymoshenko's backers expect improvement in their well-being in the next year compared to 30 percent for Yanukovych.[32]
Parliamentary elections[edit]
by party list[edit]
by constituency[edit]
Presidential elections[edit]
Voter turnout[edit]
From 1994 to 2007 the average voter turnout for the Verkhovna Rada elections was 68.13%[33][34]The total voter turnout in the2012 parliamentary electionswas then the lowest ever with 57.99%;[35]The lowest turnout in these elections was inCrimea(with 49.46%), the highest inLviv Oblast(67.13%).[35]In the2014 parliamentary electionsthe official voter turnout was set (by theCentral Election Commission of Ukraine) at 52.42%.[36]This figure was determined after the Central Electoral Commission deducted the eligible voters in areas were voting was impossible.[22]Because of the ongoingWar in Donbassand theunilateral annexationofCrimeabyRussia,the 2014 parliamentary elections were not held in Crimea and also not held in parts ofDonetsk OblastandLuhansk Oblast.[37][38]The lowest turnout in these elections was in Donetsk Oblast (with 32.4%), the highest in again in Lviv Oblast (70%).[39]According toTadeusz Olszański,of theCentre for Eastern Studies,the low turnout in Donetsk Oblast (and also Luhansk Oblast) is explained by the end of an artificial increase of voter turnout there byParty of Regionsofficials.[22]
Voter turnout in thepresidential electionsis always higher than for Verkhovna Rada elections with an average voter turnout of 72% from 2004 till 2010 (67.95% in the2010 Presidential election).[33][40]In the2014 Presidential electionthe Central Election Commission of Ukraine set the turnout at over 60%; just as in the 2014 parliamentary elections, these elections were not held in Crimea and also not held in parts of Donetsk Oblast and Luhansk Oblast.[41][42]The most popular presidential elections were the first one in 1991 where nearly 30.6 million people voted and in the 2004 election which gathered some 28 million. There were only three presidential candidates who have gathered over 10 million votes:Leonid Kravchuk(1991 - 19.6, 1994 - 10.0),Viktor Yushchenko(2004 - 11.1), andViktor Yanukovych(2004 - 11.0). The 10 million voters mark was almost reached byLeonid Kuchmain 1999, but he only gained the trust of 9.6 million. To this day Kravchuk andPetro Poroshenkoare the only presidential candidates who won the elections after the first round obtaining over 50% of votes, respective in 1991 and 2014. The person most frequently participating in presidential elections isOleksandr Morozwho stood in every presidential election since 1994 when he gained the biggest support of some 3.5 million, while in 2010 less than 0.1 million voted for him. Viktor Yanukovych became the strongest runner-up in the history of presidential elections, while Leonid Kuchma - the only runner-up of the first round to pull a win in the second one. Thus far the top two presidential candidates always would get support of over 5 million voters each.
Since the1994 Ukrainian parliamentary electionvoter turnouts have been declining. 1994 75.81%,199870.78%,200269.27%,200667.55%,200762.03%,201257.43%,201451.91% and the2019 Ukrainian parliamentary electionat 49.84%.
Perceived flaws in legislation[edit]
Despite a clear system for declaring donations to campaign funds, officials and experts say that Ukraine's election law is consistently flouted, with spending from candidates’ official funds representing only a fraction of the amount truly spent while it is rarely clear where the funding comes from.[43]
Early May 2009, the "Committee of Voters of Ukraine" stated they believe that the use of the state'sadministrative resourcesbypolitical forcesfor their own national and localelection campaignsis no longer a decisive factor in the outcome of Ukrainian elections.[44]According to a survey of 2,000 people conducted in October 2010 by two Ukrainian nongovernmental organizations, the Democratic Initiatives Fund andOPORA,one in five Ukrainians were willing to sell his or her vote in the then upcoming2010 Ukrainian local elections.[45]But according to (then)Ukrainian Prime MinisterMykola Azarovthese elections "were absolutely without the use ofadministrative resources,naturally. Nobody interfered with our citizens. "[46]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^"Constitution of Ukraine"(PDF).February 7, 2019. Article 83, Paragraph 4.Retrieved27 August2023.
- ^abc"Parliament passes law on parliamentary elections".Kyiv Post.Interfax-Ukraine.17 November 2011.Retrieved9 August2015.
- ^Q&A: Ukrainian parliamentary election,BBC News(23 October 2012)
- ^(in Ukrainian)Law of Ukraine "On Elections of People's Deputies of Ukraine" dated 17 November 2011,Verkhovna Rada
- ^ab(in Ukrainian)Early to rejoice? Regular parliamentary elections may take place under Yanukovych's law,Civil movement "Chesno"(11 July 2019)
- ^abElectoral Code becomes effective in Ukraine,Interfax-Ukraine(1 January 2010)
- ^"Ukraine: The Law on Election of the People's Deputies (Unofficial translation by IFES), 2011"(PDF).17 November 2011.Retrieved9 August2015.
- ^"Rada fails to put on today's agenda three bills on elections of MPs".Interfax-Ukraine.14 August 2014.Retrieved8 August2015.
- ^"Voters Committee Predicting 60% Snap Election Turnout".Ukrainian News Agency.16 October 2008. Archived fromthe originalon 27 May 2009.Retrieved16 October2008.
- ^Hacked PR documents accelerate political war,Kyiv Post(11 January 2013)
- ^Vitali Klitschko says intends to run for president in Ukraine,Interfax-Ukraine(24 October 2013)
Parliament passes law that could prevent Klitschko from running for president,Interfax-Ukraine(24 October 2013) - ^Poroshenko signs notorious 'party dictatorship' law,Ukraine Today(25 February 2016)
(in Ukrainian)Lyashko advantage of the law on "party dictatorship",Ukrayinska Pravda(3 March 2016) - ^(in Ukrainian)CEC excluded from party list Lyashko 10 candidates for people's deputies,Ukrayinska Pravda(18 December 2016)
- ^abCampaign false start: who is already advertised in the Dnipro,Civil movement "Chesno"(26 August 2020)(in Ukrainian)
- ^abCEC member: Kyiv City Council to be elected for five years in upcoming election,Interfax-Ukraine(16 February 2013)
- ^Experts: Proposed election law casts cloud over next year’s parliamentary contest,Kyiv Post(October 3, 2011)
- ^Understanding Ukrainian Politics: Power, Politics, And Institutional DesignbyPaul D'Anieri,M.E. Sharpe,2006,ISBN0-7656-1811-7(page 251)
- ^Black Sea Fleet vote: Know thy turncoats,Kyiv Post(May 6, 2010)
- ^Ukraine needs constitutional change now,Kyiv Post(May 7, 2009)
- ^Parliament rejects bill on local elections under open lists,Kyiv Post(July 1, 2010)
- ^European Parliament EU-Ukraine PCC Members' delegation to Ukraine observing local and regional elections of 31 October 2010,European Parliament(10 November 2010)
- ^abcdOlszański, Tadeusz A. (29 October 2014),A strong vote for reform: Ukraine after the parliamentary elections,OSW—Centre for Eastern Studies
- ^Центральна виборча комісія України - WWW відображення ІАС "Вибори народних депутатів України 2012"Archived2012-10-16 at theWayback Machine
"CEC substitutes Tymoshenko, Lutsenko in voting papers".30 August 2012. Archived fromthe originalon 13 August 2014.Retrieved6 November2015. - ^Communist and Post-Communist Parties in EuropebyUwe BackesandPatrick Moreau,Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht,2008,ISBN978-3-525-36912-8(page 396)
- ^Ukraine right-wing politics: is the genie out of the bottle?,openDemocracy.net(January 3, 2011)
- ^abEight Reasons Why Ukraine’s Party of Regions Will Win the 2012 ElectionsbyTaras Kuzio,The Jamestown Foundation(17 October 2012)
UKRAINE: Yushchenko needs Tymoshenko as ally againArchived2013-05-15 at theWayback MachinebyTaras Kuzio,Oxford Analytica(5 October 2007) - ^After the parliamentary elections in Ukraine: a tough victory for the Party of RegionsArchived2013-03-17 at theWayback Machine,Centre for Eastern Studies(7 November 2012)
- ^Election winner lacks strong voter mandate,Kyiv Post(February 11, 2010)
Ukraine's Party of Regions: A pyrrhic victory,EurActiv.com(16 November 2012)
Ukraine vote ushers in new constellation of power,Deutsche Welle(30 October 2012) - ^Olszański, Tadeusz A. (28 May 2014),Poroshenko, President of Ukraine,OSW—Centre for Eastern Studies
- ^General official results of Rada election,Interfax-Ukraine(11 November 2014)
Central Election Commission announces official results of Rada election on party tickets,Interfax-Ukraine(11 November 2014) - ^Ukraine's Party of Regions Refuses to Participate in Rada Elections,RIA Novosti(23 September 2014)
- ^Disappointment, pessimism high among nation’s voters,Kyiv Post(January 15, 2010)
- ^ab"Country View Ukraine".International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance.Archived fromthe originalon 2009-02-13.Retrieved2008-10-16.
- ^Central Election Commission of Ukraine
- ^abCEC:Turnout in Ukraine's parliamentary elections 57.99%,Kyiv Post(29 October 2012)
- ^Voter turnout at Rada election 52.42% at all 198 constituencies - CEC,Interfax-Ukraine(27 October 2014)
- ^"Ukraine crisis: President calls snap vote amid fighting".BBC News.25 August 2014.Archivedfrom the original on 27 August 2014.Retrieved30 August2014.
- ^"Ukraine elections: Runners and risks".BBC News.22 May 2014. Archived fromthe originalon 27 May 2014.Retrieved29 May2014.
- ^Voter turnout at Rada election 52.42% at all 198 constituenciesArchived2014-12-03 at theWayback Machine,National Radio Company of Ukraine(27 October 2014)
- ^"Swiss President, Luxembourg PM join others in congratulating Yushchenko".Kyiv Post.31 December 2004.
- ^"CEC chair: Ukrainian presidential election turnout tops 60 percent".Kyivpost.com. 26 May 2014.Retrieved2 June2014.
- ^Poroshenko Declares Victory in Ukraine Presidential Election,The Wall Street Journal(25 May 2014)
- ^More than $1 billion will be spent on campaign, but no one knows for sure,Kyiv Post(January 14, 2010)
- ^Committee Of Voters: Use Of State’s Administrative Resources No Longer Decisive Factor In Outcome Of ElectionsArchived2009-07-21 at theWayback Machine,Ukrainian News Agency(May 8, 2009)
- ^Survey Shows Every Fifth Ukrainian Ready To Sell Vote,Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty(October 22, 2010)
- ^Yanukovych's Party Looks To Victory Amid Claims Of Election Fraud,Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty(November 01, 2010)
External links[edit]
Media related toElections in Ukraineat Wikimedia Commons- Central Election Commission of Ukraine
- UKR.VOTE Elections List
- Adam Carr's Election Archive
- Parties and Elections
- Serhiy Vasylchenko: Electoral Geography of Ukraine 1991 - 2010
- If parliamentary elections were held next Sunday how would you vote? (Recurrent poll since 2010)byRazumkov Centre
- Rating of parties since 2006bySociological group "RATING"
