On September 13, the Verkhovna Rada votedto dissolve the Central Election Commission. 10 days after, only four factions submitted nominees for CEC members to the President. Moreover, only one of them did it within time constraints established by the law.
Civil Network OPORA has submitted an information request to the President's Office to find out which factions of political parties have already submitted nominees to the President. In the evening of September 23, Office of the President responded to OPORA's request informing that it had received the following nominees from factions:
- Opposition Platform - For Life: Serhii Dubovyk, Yurii Miroshnychenko(the letter was delivered on September 13);
- European Solidarity - Oleksandr Chernenko, Yurii Buhlak(September 16);
- Holos - Andrii Hevko (September 16);
- AUU Batkivshchyna - Zhanna Usenko-Chorna, Viktoriia Hlushchenko(September 16 and September 17, respectively).
Besides that, declarations from 6 persons marked as "Candidate for a Member of the Central Election Commission" have been published on website of electronic declarationsas of September 23. Five of them (Yurii Miroshnychenko, Serhii Dubovyk, Serhii Postivyi, Andrii Yevstihnieiev, Yurii Buhlak) filed declarations on September 19-21, and one (Serhii Rumpa) - in May this year.
As long as those, who were nominated by factions (Yurii Miroshnychenko, Serhii Dubovyk, Yurii Buhlak) are among those who submitted declarations in September, we may assume that Serhii Postivyi and Andrii Yevstihnieievcan also become candidates for CEC members, despite we don't know which faction or group they are going to represent.
Who is who?
Serhii Dubovykhas been working as a Deputy Head ofSecretariat of the Central Election Commission since 2014. He was a member of the Central Election Commission headed by Serhii Kivalov in 2004 and by Yaroslav Davydovych, had been CEC's Secretary from 2004 to 2007. From October 2013 to April 2014, he was an adviser to the Head of the Central Election Commission, Mykhailo Okhendovskyi.
Yurii Miroshnychenkowas a Member of Parliament from V to VIII convocations, in early 2019 parliamentary elections he was 41st in the list of party Opposition Platform - For Life.
Oleksandr Chernenkowas a Member of Parliament of VIII convocation, and Head of the Board of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine before that. He ran under number 34 in the list of European Solidarity party in early elections.
Yurii Buhlak was an MP of VIII convocation, Head of Subcommittee on the Prevention and Combating of Corruption of the Committee of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine on the Prevention and Combating of Corruption.
Andrii Hevkowas an assistant to Member of the Central Election Commission Leontii Shypilov, and worked at the Reanimation Package of Reforms as an Advocacy Manager and Head of the Coalition's Advocacy Department. In early parliamentary elections, he was nominated by the Holos party under #23 in the list.
Zhanna Usenko-Chornawas a member of the Central Election Commission in 2004, and Deputy Head of the Central Election Commission chaired by Mykhailo Okhendovskyi from 2007 to 2018.
Victoriia Hlushchenkoholds the position of Chief Consultant at the Division of Representation in Courts of Legal Support Department of the Secretariat of the Central Election Commission.
Serhii Postivyihas been the Secretary at Executive Committee of Bilotserkivsk City Council since 2017.
Andrei Yevstihnieiev was a member of the previous Central Election Commission.
Find detailed biographical information about each candidate and potential candidate for CEC membership in our longread.
What about deadlines?
It should be mentioned that on September 18, the First Deputy Head of the Servant of the People faction Oleksandr Korniienko told reportersin the lobby of Parliament that the faction has already submitted 12-13 candidates to the President. However, the President's Office did not provide information on these proposals on September 23. One may assume that the faction did not submit the list of candidates to the President through official channels of communication.
Civil Network OPORA has also sent information requests to five parliamentary factions and one group of MPs asking for a list of nominees for CEC members they submitted. We will update this material as soon as we receive answers to information requests.
Article 31.1(3) of the Law of Ukraine on the Central Election Commission says: "Parliamentary factions in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine shall submit nominees for the CEC members to the President of Ukraine no later than on the next day after early dissolution of the whole Commission. Based on these nominations, the President of Ukraine shall submit to the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine a submission on the personal composition of the Commission within three days."
Thus, after voting in the Parliament, factions were supposed to submit their nominees for the CEC members to the Head of State on September 14, and the President - to register the submission before September 18.
We would like to remind, according to mass media information, on September 9 the President madea submission on early dissolution of the Central Election Commission in the Parliament. On September 11, a group of MPs registered the corresponding draft resolution #2127in the Verkhovna Rada. On the same day, the Subcommittee on Election Matters of the Committee on State Building, Regional Policy and Local Self-Government had a meeting, where members of the subcommittee recommended the Committee to consider and support dissolution of the CEC on its meeting. The Committee's meetingwas held at noon, where it was decided to recommend the Verkhovna Rada to consider and support President Volodymyr Zelensky's motion to dissolve the Central Election Commission. 15 members of the Committee voted in for this decision, 7 abstained, 1 voted against. On September 13, Verkhovna Rada voted on the dissolution of the Central Election Commission. This decision was supported by 341 MPs.