Voters should vote for the party election programs, emphasized Rebecca Harms, Head of the Greens in the European Parliament and member of the European Parliament Election Observation Mission during a press conference at the International Media Center in Kyiv on October 25, 2014, the day before the scheduled parliamentary elections in Ukraine.

Harms noted that she had taken part in election monitoring in Ukraine for over a decade, and noted many positive developments in that time period. The most pressing issue of the current elections was the fact that one-seventh of the population—those in the conflict regions in the eastern part of Ukraine and in Crimea—will not be able to vote.  The most important task for the future parliament, Harms emphasized, will be “to reform the election law and media law.” However, she also insisted that political parties in Ukraine must develop “real political programs.”  Harms explained that in the past, political parties did not produce written programs to ensure that voters have access to the parties’ political platforms. The “political programs of each party should be clear and transparent.”

The Council of Europe is monitoring the situation in Ukraine attentively, according to Francois Frederic, Head of the Department of the Council of Europe Elections Assistance. “We have enacted many programs to support civil society and to strength control over politicians.” As Frederic noted, politics and the election process are too important to be left only to the politicians themselves to regulate. The Council of Europe supports election-related projects of both OPORA and CVU. In particular, CVU is currently monitoring election disputes resolution, and will publish a first report after E-Day.

The current election laws allow for the elections in Ukraine to be conducted according to international standards, but as the Deputy General Director and Program Director of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine (CVU) Natalia Lynnyk explained, the law has some significant drawbacks that make certain kinds of abuses possible. According to Lynnyk, “the majority system is still one of the main gaps through which 99% of abuses take place.” In addition, numerous issues have arisen in connection with voter registration addresses. Approximately 200 thousand voters who had changed their places of voting and 500 thousand voters who vote abroad will be able to vote only for party lists, but not for candidates in single-mandate constituencies.  The result is that the guarantee of equal suffrage is not being upheld.  Also, the Verkhovna Rada has not made amendments concerning the issue of holding elections in the occupied territories, nor has it resolved issues related to the transparency of campaign finance for political parties. According to Lynnyk, a positive development has been a much higher rate of reporting of election violations. More people have made the effort to report these violations, and the media coverage has drawn greater attention to these violations, even though the total number of violations this year has decreased.Despite improvements in the election process, the danger remains that election outcomes will not be universally accepted abroad. Ohla Aivazovska, Election Program Coordinator for the Civil Network OPORA warned that, after the election results are announced, “the thesis will emerge in the international discourse that the Ukrainian parliament does not represent the opinion of the entire population and therefore is illegitimate.” This line, she pointed out, will most likely come from the Russian Federation. Aivazovska explained that    according to Ukrainian legislation, however, “the parliament is valid if two-thirds of the 450 deputies are elected, that is, at least 300 members of parliament. According to our preliminary estimates, only 27 MPs (12 from Crimea, 9 from Donetsk region, and 6 from Luhansk region) will not be elected.” 

“Although the legislation has never been perfect, the most important thing is how Ukraine wants to adhere to international standards.” There remain some problems concerning bribery of voters,  but Aivazovska hopes that as the result of increased criminal liability, including for individual citizens (50 to 100 thousand hrivnas  fine or up to two years of community service or imprisonment), the real threat of punishment for violations will reduce the number of violations in the future. “At the present time, 227 criminal cases have already begun, 85 of which concern bribery of voters, and Central Election Commission issued a warning for several candidates. We could not even imagine this situation in 2012.”