The launch of campaign for re-election in five districts is quite peaceful, without serious conflicts among candidates. During the reporting period, OPORA observers haven't noticed any violations of electoral legislation, which could have influence on voting results.
As long as the registration of candidates will end on November 19 and not all the candidates have officially started the race, the election campaign started quite peacefully and slowly. Besides that, the full list of candidates, particularly those from pro-power parties, wasn't officially promulgated. Simultaneously, there were some incidents, and subjects of the election process, as well as state authorities and law enforcement agencies, should take the corresponding measures.
In particular, the voter bribery and abuse of administrative resource. A candidate from AUU Svoboda Yurii Levchenko (ED #223) has filed a statement to the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine claiming that his opponent Viktor Pylypyshyn committed voter bribery. The plaintiff provided two videos as a proof, where citizens are proposed money if they vote for V. Pylypyshyn. Simultaneously, the latter hasn't filed documents to the CEC and is not a candidate for MP of Ukraine. In district #94, Head of Kyiv OSA Anatolii Prysiazhniuk, Head of Vasylkiv RSA Oleksandr Komakh, Vasylkiv City Mayor Volodymyr Sabadash were presenting reanimation ambulances to the office of Kyiv Oblast Center for Emergency and Disaster Medicine together with a potential candidate Ruslan Badaiev. Some time later, in his comment to the media, A. Prysiazhniuk expressed his gratitude to R. Badaiev as a benefactor "for assistance in procurement of reanimation ambulances. And they are not cheap – 670 thousand UAH every car."
Another unfair campaigning method used, is registration of so-called clones of well-known politicians as candidates for MPs of Ukraine. Thus, in district #94 (Kyiv oblast) 5 clones wearing the same surnames were registered (two candidates with names: S. Vlasenko, O. Semerak, Yu. Karmazin, and V. Romaniuk).
Another urgent issue is the influence of so-called technical parties and their members in district election commissions. On repeated elections, the DECs suffered from personnel rotations, what may jeopardize the proper organization of their activities. Besides that, according to the statistical analysis of the DECs' staffing, 13% of members in new commissions have already held the same positions in the same districts in 2012.
During the repeated parliamentary elections, candidates don't submit declarations on assets, income, expenses, and financial obligations to the CEC. Therefore, the voters are deprived of the right to make a choice based on full information about candidates for MPs of Ukraine. Besides that, the transparency of financial activities of persons, standing as candidates for MPs of Ukraine, is not secured.
Civil Network OPORA - is a non-governmental, non-political and financially independent all-Ukrainian network of activists. We united to enhance public participation in the political process by developing and implementing models of citizen participation in the activities of state and local governments.