Any Means Will Do When Fighting for Victory... Smear in Election Campaign in Odesa Oblast
Many candidates for a deputy seat haven't stinted unconventional anti–campaigning methods both in August and September, and used smear to discredit a rival.
The highest number of such cases were registered in Kyivskyi Raion of Odesa (E.D. 133), E.D.142 (the centre in Artsyz), and E.D.143 (the centre in Izmail).
Kyivskyi District — Epicentre of Smear
The most striking example is Kyivskyi Raion of Odesa, where Oleksii Honcharenko (the candidate of PR) and Ihor Markov (self-nominated candidate) compete in the election. In the full view of the voters, a real information war broke out, and all's fair in war as they say. Information resources controlled by the candidates are constantly trying to discredit their main enemies. By the end of the month, one more candidate from the same district has joined this „war“ — Vadym Chornyi, who also owns a website.
The most recent example of using smear stirred up not only the experts but ordinary voters as well. The disclosure, in early September, on the specially created website — Uralovleaks— of the purport to be correspondence on Facebook of Semen Uralov, who is the political consultant of Ihor Markov, became a killer. In this correspondence, the political consultant purports to complaint about support of the governor Oleksii Honcharenko, despite the agreement reached, and also informs on many other facts that are of interest for experts.
Almost immediately Semen Uralov stated that his Facebook page and e-mail had been corrupted. And then, the analysis of Uralovleaks website by the well-known journalist Mustapha Naiiem and Afina PR Agency from Kharkiv appeared, showing a large number of fake e-mails on it. Then, Hrabro.com — the website owned by the candidate of the same district Vadym Chornyi — criticised the arguments of the authors of the website expertise and, in particular, proved the absurdity of one of the main ones — the keyword search.
According to Semen Uralov himself, when the amount of fake messages on Uralovleaks exceeded 10%, he stopped paying attention to it. Currently, according to Semen Uralov, there are around 30% of such messages on the website.
Therefore, one can be assured the issue of Uralovleaks will be used in the electoral competition for a long time, and the candidates will be fouling each other more and more.
Uneasy Bessarabiia
However, not only district 133 of Odesa demonstrates unethical methods of campaigning. For example, in August, in Bessarabia a false issue of the newspaper of the Association of Bulgarians — Obozrenie — was distributed. The fraud published false election programme of the candidate in the district 142 Anton Kisse, who is a deputy of the PR in Odesa Oblast Council.
Ihor Plokhoi — the candidate of the PR in the E.D.142 (the centre in Artsyz) — also has own detractors. Here, on 24 August, detractors of the candidate organised an event with its participants demonstrating placards with the eloquent mottoes „The Party of Regions gave Artsyz a pig“ (to give a pig in Ukrainian means to do dirty on somebody) and „Artsyz without Plokhoi“. The highlight of the event was a live pig itself which, according to the idea of the picketers, should have symbolised Ihor Plokhoi. However, Ihor Plokhoi took this event with humour and even took pictures with the picketers.
The practice of using smear has continued in September as well. Indeed, on 8 September, in Tarutyne Raion of Odesa Oblast, leaflets against the candidate for People's Deputy in the election district No.142 Ihor Plokhoi were enclosed virtually into every copy of the Bronenosets (The Ironclad) newspaper. Despite the fact that in the leaflets themselves, it was stated they were the leaflets of the Bolhrad Without Plokhoi Civic Initiative, the representative of Tarutyne Raion Headquarters of the Party of Regions Ivan Dolhorukyi believes these leaflets to be produced and circulated by the candidate for People's Deputy Anton Kisse. Meanwhile, the agent of Anton Kisse in Tarutyne Raion Olha Kichidzhi denied these accusations. According to her, Anton Kisse has nothing to do with the abovementioned activities.
In the neighbouring E.D.143, nothing new was invented but there is still enough dirt there. Back from the expected confrontation of the majoritarians Yurii Kruk (the PR) and Oleksandr Dubovyi (United Opposition), the buildings of Izmail have been covered with negative statements about both of them. Although Oleksandr Dubovyi has decided to run not in the majoritarian district but on the list of the political force, the graffiti remains. These statements still remind school showdowns on the 'you are an idiot' principle. Some say „Yurii Kruk is a friend of gays“, the others — „Dubovyi is a thief and a raider“.
However, the latter is yet less fortunate that his competitor Kruk. In late August, a special edition of the Slovyanskyi Soiuz (The Slavic Union) newspaper appeared, devoted to exposing 'past negative acts of Oleksandr Dubovyi and his raider activities'. A well-known in the region journalist Valeriy Peikov was also in the wrong place, at the wrong time — the article in this newspaper was signed in his name when, of course, hadn't been written by him. After a little investigation, the journalist discovered that the newspaper was „cloned“, and that the editor of the pseudo issue had nothing to do with it, and actually had never published the newspaper in such format. At the printer's which prints the Slovyanskyi Soiuz newspaper the fraud was confirmed.
Also, not quite fair methods of anti-campaigning were recently used at the celebration of the Town Day of the town of Reni. When the candidate Yurii Kruk was speaking on stage a small group of young people who supported his rival Volodymyr Bodelan chanted 'Way to the young!'. Another candidate of the same district, Vyacheslav Strashylin was personally handing out leaflets in which he begged to vote for anyone except Yurii Kruk.
However, the use of smear hasn't stopped here. Just yesterday, leaflets were pasted up all over Izmail, by some organisation calling itself Public Watch MES, directed against Volodymyr Bodelan. In them, on the behalf of the candidate, implementation of a series of rigid actions against Izmail residents who have debts for public utility services were proposed.
North of Oblast is No Exception
The north of Odesa Oblast is not that bright in this context but still, there are cases of using smear. Indeed, not long ago, the posters of the granny with a cat and the statement „Discovered the grandson voted for the PR — made the house over to the cat“, well-known on the internet, appeared in Kotovsk. The posters hung on the walls of Kotovsk for two weeks but local grannies probably didn't like them — the posters were removed.
The oppositional people's deputy Hennadii Moskal didn't sting anti-campaigning either when speaking in support of the candidate of the United Opposition Oleksandr Horin in Rozdilna. He was carried away while campaigning for the representative of the Fatherland so much that crossed the line and called the Ukraine — Forward Party 'a child of the Presidential Administration and the Party of Regions', and also asked not to link it to the Fatherland since it 'disgraces its good name'. Ostap Stupka, in Hennadii Moskal's opinion, 'disgraces the good name of his father'. The opposition member eloquently doubted the efficiency of the candidacy of the Golden Ball's owner Andrii Shevchenko and the majoritarian candidates of 'the boxer'.
To conclude, I would like to note that, according to eminent advertising professionals, smear is still PR. Often, the use of smear technology only plays to the hands of those whom they were supposed to harm, and vice versa — adds negativity to the party being the author of smear. The effectiveness of such methods of political struggle is very doubtful indeed. Therefore, candidates for People's Deputy should refrain from using smear technology, and voters should try not to take such information seriously.
Yaroslav Katolyk