Ukraine Presidential Election 2014/05/25

Final Reports of EPDE Election Experts on the Presidential Elections in Ukraine 25 May 2014 - Arkadii Lyubarev: Legal Aspects and Election Campaign - Piotr Andrusieczko: Mass Media Reporting - Maria Amparo Tortosa-Garrigós: Security Situation Berlin, 24 June 2014 European Platform for Democratic Elections (EPDE) conducted election observation of the Presidential elections in Ukraine, 25 May 2014. Among other activities, EPDE organized a Civic Experts’ Mission on security issues, the role of the media and the use of administrative resources during the election campaign. Three election experts - Arkadii Lyubarev, Piotr Andrusieczko and Maria Amparo Tortosa- Garrigós carried out their field research in Ukraine from 8 th to 15 th May 2014. This brochure contains final reports of the EPDE Civic Experts’ Mission. IMPRESSUM Europäischer Austausch (European Exchange) gGmbH Erkelenzdamm 59, 10999 Berlin Phone: +49 (0) 30 616 71 464 - 0 Fax: +49 (0) 30 616 71 464 - 4 E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.european-exchange.org www.epde.org This broschure is financially supported by 2 Contents Arkadii Lyubarev: Legal Aspects and Election Campaign ………………………..……………………………..4 Piotr Andrusieczko: Mass Media Reporting …………………………………………..……………………………20 Maria Amparo Tortosa-Garrigós: Security Situation ……………………………………………………………28 3 Legal Aspects and Election Campaign by Arkadi Lyubarev This report is based on author observations from the campaign for the election of the President of Ukraine on 25 May 2014 during his trips to Kiev on 8–15 May and 23–27 May as well as after studying materials related to the election campaign. 1. Problems found during previous Ukrainian national elections After Ukraine’s independence in 1991, the country has had 10 national election campaigns – six parliamentary campaigns (1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, 2007 and 2012) and four presidential campaigns (1994, 1999, 2004 and 2010). The presidential campaign of 2004 was the most dramatic. Due to multiple violations in the course of the polling day, the Supreme Court of Justice of Ukraine cancelled the results of the run-offs (49,4% for Viktor Yanukovich and 46,7% for Viktor Yushchenko). Given the narrow difference between the candidates’ results, a proper count of the voters’ will was deemed impossible. A repeated ballot was scheduled, which lead to the victory of Victor Yushchenko with a result of 52% of the votes cast. The subsequent election campaigns (parliamentary polls in 2006, 2007, and 2012 and presidential polls in 2010) gained increased attention on behalf of international organizations (OSCE/ODIHR, ENEMO and others). In their reports, these organizations pointed out at a series of electoral legislation and procedural shortcomings in Ukraine. For all the campaigns, international organizations registered cases of abuse of the administrative resource. Thus, in 2007, ENEMO mission noted: “Compared to the pre-electoral period of 2006, the ENEMO observers witnessed a large number of cases of use of state and administrative resources in the election campaign.” In particular, there were mentions of the participation of governors, mayors and other representatives of the local government in campaigning for a certain political party as well as creating obstacles for the campaigning of others. The President also campaigned in favor of a political party. A small amount of cases of participation of government officials in electoral campaigning was noted during the presidential election of 2010. In the report of the OSCE/ODIHR mission for the 2012 election, the following forms of abuse of administrative resources were reported: use of official measures, meetings or public works to promote the party or certain candidates, active participation of local and regional officials in meetings with candidates during working hours, forced participation of workers of state and municipal enterprises to meetings with the candidates, campaigning materials in the newspapers or on the sites of regional and local administration bodies, cases when candidates were refused meetings with the voters, scheduled meetings were cancelled, or their occurrence was impeded for no valid reason. 4 OSCE/ODIHR and ENEMO also noted, in 2012, the decline of pluralism in the media, intimidation and pressure on journalists, and a clear bias in favor of the ruling Party of Regions by state-run media. As for the buying of voters, the 2007 and 2010 election reports mentioned individual or unconfirmed cases. In 2012, larger numbers of cases of vote buying by candidates were reported. However, this may be due primarily to the fact that, in 2012 (as opposed to presidential elections and parliamentary elections in 2006 and 2007), there were candidates running for single-mandate districts. The reports noted there were complications with the creation of District (DECs) and Precinct (PEC) Electoral Commissions. There were many cases of refusals of appointed commissioners to fulfill their duties, which lead to a constant change of the composition of the Commissions, making them often unable to make decisions due to the lack of quorums. Insufficient funding and poor logistics of election commissions were also reported. The legally founded principle, which states that electoral commissions are formed by participants in the electoral process, is intended to ensure the neutrality of the electoral commissions. However, reports in 2012 stated that this was not achieved in all cases. Thus, a number of “technical” parties provided election commissions with a large number of members who, in 2010, were part of the same commission on behalf of candidate Yanukovich. This way, Commissions could form majorities based on actual supporters of the Party of Regions. The reports of 2006 and 2007 elections noted an extremely low quality of voter lists -absence of many voters (including entire households) from the lists, double counting, which could allow voters to vote more than once. By the 2010 elections in Ukraine, the State register of voters was established. Nevertheless, in its 2010 election report, the ENEMO mission noted that: “the accuracy of voter lists continues to be a problem for these elections.” In 2012, the situation was better, but even then, in 16% of the polling stations, cases were reported when voters could not find themselves in the lists. In the course of the Polling Day, biggest issues were registered with voting outside of the polling stations. In particular, in 2010, the report of the ENEMO Mission noted that the PECs in different regions found different solutions to the problems associated with the inclusion of the voters in the list for such voting. During the 2012 elections, a big issue became the way certain DECs proceeded to receive PECs tabulation protocols. Reported issues included absence of transparency, data manipulation, changing data in the process of computer input. In five single-mandate constituencies election results were cancelled. 2. Presidential election legislation and its shortcomings Following the announcement of the 2014 presidential election, numerous changes were made to the Law of Ukraine “On the Election of the President of Ukraine” seven separate times: on February 28, March 13, April 8, April 17, May 6, May 15 and May 20. 5 The most significant amendments were passed on 13 March: 90 articles of the Law were changed (out of total 105 articles), nine new articles were added, and five items excluded. In fact, a completely new version of the law was adopted. Thus, the electoral legislation of Ukraine is characterized by extreme volatility, which is not in line with the recommendations of the Venice Commission. Nevertheless, many of the changes made during the campaign were needed. They comply with the recommendations of national and international organizations monitoring the elections, and were designed to overcome the shortcomings noted in previous campaigns. Changes made were similar to those made to the Law of Ukraine "On the Election of People's Deputies of Ukraine". The timetable for electoral action during early presidential elections was also specified. Some changes were dictated by the current situation and new circumstances, in particular, the inability to conduct elections in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol, and the risk of jeopardizing the voting in other regions. The amendment passed on May 6 was due to the lack of quorum in PEC members - it reduced the minimum number of PEC members from 12 to 9. The Ukrainian Law “On the Election of the President of Ukraine” (as amended on March 13, 2014 and later), which governed during the campaign, was largely consistent with international standards and allowed to conduct free and fair elections. Many of the provisions of this law may serve as a model for other countries, in particular Russia. Nevertheless, the law has kept a number of shortcomings, which are noted below. Thus, the Law contains a number of rules designed to prevent abuse of administrative resources. Section 2 of Paragraph 4 of Article 3 prohibits the intervention of public authorities and local administration in the electoral process, except as for the cases provided by this Law. Section 4 of the same paragraph requires an equal and equitable treatment of public authorities and local governments and their officials for the candidates standing for Ukrainian Presidency. Section 2 of Paragraph 1 of Article 64 prohibits participation in campaigning of executive authorities and local governments, law enforcement agencies and courts, their officials and officers during business

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