Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
07KYIV2247
2007-09-07 13:50:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Kyiv
Cable title:  

UKRAINE: EVEN SMALL ELECTION ABUSES COULD

Tags:  PGOV PREL PINR UP 
pdf how-to read a cable
VZCZCXRO1290
PP RUEHLMC
DE RUEHKV #2247/01 2501350
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 071350Z SEP 07
FM AMEMBASSY KYIV
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 3650
INFO RUEHZG/NATO EU COLLECTIVE
RUCNCIS/CIS COLLECTIVE
RUEHLMC/MILLENNIUM CHALLENGE CORP WASHDC
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 05 KYIV 002247 

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/07/2017
TAGS: PGOV PREL PINR UP
SUBJECT: UKRAINE: EVEN SMALL ELECTION ABUSES COULD
INFLUENCE OUTCOME OF SEPTEMBER VOTE

REF: A. KYIV 001722


B. KYIV 002125

C. KYIV 01808

D. KYIV 02239

E. KYIV 02202

F. KYIV 02206

G. KYIV 01986

Classified By: Ambassador for reasons 1.4(b,d).

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 05 KYIV 002247

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/07/2017
TAGS: PGOV PREL PINR UP
SUBJECT: UKRAINE: EVEN SMALL ELECTION ABUSES COULD
INFLUENCE OUTCOME OF SEPTEMBER VOTE

REF: A. KYIV 001722


B. KYIV 002125

C. KYIV 01808

D. KYIV 02239

E. KYIV 02202

F. KYIV 02206

G. KYIV 01986

Classified By: Ambassador for reasons 1.4(b,d).


1. Summary. As the campaign heats up for Ukraine's September
30 preterm parliamentary elections, few anticipate there will
be massive election fraud. However, in what is expected to
be a very tight race, even abuses on the margins could
influence the outcome. Greater transparency in the election
system, increased domestic and international scrutiny, and
the high stakes if a leader is caught engaged in fraud make
large amounts of falsification unlikely. So far the tone of
the campaign has been restrained and the highly-politicized
Central Election Commission (CEC) has managed to move forward
in making the necessary preparations for the vote. The
prevailing sentiment in KYIV now is that the election will
not be nearly as bad as 2004, but that both through
disorganization and, in some cases, by intent, it could be
worse than the March 2006 elections, which were hailed as the
best in Ukraine's history.


2. (C) Polls and local political analysts suggest that BYuT
and OU-PSD on the one hand and Regions and the Communists on
the other are roughly tied meaning that an advantage of one
to two percent of the vote could alter seat allocations in
the new Rada, and affect the formation of the future
government coalition. All forces are drawing on
administrative resources to support their campaigns (albeit
perhaps less than in the past); the Prime Minister and
President's teams are using national-level resources, but all
forces have local government power to bring to bear in
different regions. Beyond this, abuse and influence are
likely to appear in a number of forms -- among these, the
invalidation of the results of certain polling stations to
lower a specific party's national rating, abusing the mobile
ballot box, and sponsoring minor parties to strip votes from
competitors. We expect some vote manipulation by the major
parties will be intended to keep the vote for peripheral

parties under the 3% threshold for entering the Rada, as was
alleged in 2006, by Vitrenko's Progressive Socialists (PSPU),
Pora-PRP, and the Kostenko-Plyushch Bloc. Disenfranchisement
of voters is also likely due to new articles in the election
law requiring the Border Guards to update voter lists as
citizens leave the country and the decision to eliminate
absentee ballots; changes that CEC Chairman Shapoval told the
Ambassador were intentional and problematic. Finally, all
sides appear to be preparing post-election court challenges
and seeking favorable judges to issue preferred rulings --
these court challenges could slow the seating of the Rada and
the formation of a new government.


3. (C) In the end, the Party of Regions probably has a slight
advantage in its ability to abuse the system because it has
more experience successfully doing so, has more money at its
disposal, is more organized, and heavily dominates in the
East and South, which gives it freer reign to act. Regions
will mostly be monitored in the east by the Communists and
Vitrenko, where the Communists may be complicit. In
contrast, BYuT and OU will serve as a check on each other's
shenanigans in the west and center, given the high level of
competition between the two for their shared electorate.
There is likely to be no major party inclined to care if
PSPU, or any other smaller party, complains after the
election that it was cheated out of seats. To promote
elections as clean as 2006, we are vigilantly reminding all
sides that a bad election will harm Ukraine's standing in the
democratic community and could give critics in Europe further
fuel to argue that Ukraine is not ready for the EU. End
summary and comment.

Few Votes Up For Grabs
--------------


4. (C) Political analysts and observers, both in KYIV and in
the oblasts, have told us that they expect the vote
distribution between the three main parties to be roughly
similar to 2006, with the Communists also making it over the
three-percent barrier. The possibility remains that a fifth
party will make it; for example, Head of the International
Democracy Institute Serhiy Taran told us that he believed
Lytvyn had a shot. This leaves only 5-10% of voters up for
grabs, including some undecideds and much of the Socialist
electorate, which Taran believed will split between Lutsenko
and Regions.

KYIV 00002247 002 OF 005




5. (C) Because the vote will be so close, the difference of a
few percentage points could still make a difference in seat
allocation in the new Rada. With no party likely to get an
outright majority alone, they will all be calculating how
many seats they need to have the upper hand in coalition
negotiations. Head of Committee of Voters of Ukraine Ihor
Popov, who usually tends to be pessimistic, was confident
that there was enough transparency in the voting system now
to stop massive efforts to falsify the vote; he expected at
most 1% of the vote could be falsified. However, he warned
that it would not require a lot of fraud to affect the
outcome when a couple of percentage points could make all the
difference in seat allocation. Popov provided the following
example: 100,000 people is .8% of the vote -- that's only 500
polling stations, out of 34,000, tampering with 200 votes
each, an easy feat.

Money Will Play a Role
--------------


6. (C) The most direct way to influence an election is simply
to buy votes. The June 17 mayoral election in Irpin
demonstrated an easy way to use money to directly buy votes.
CVU monitors there reported that students used cellphones to
take pictures of their ballots cast in favor of the candidate
backed by both Regions and Our Ukraine; once the photos were
emailed out, the students received 50 UAH ($10) in their cell
phone accounts (ref A). The OSCE's Office of Democratic
Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) reports various parties
have been handing out gifts to voters, a long-standing trick
in parliamentary elections here. The ODIHR media monitor and
a journalist in Cherkasy (ref B) both mentioned to us the
concern that in addition to legally-approved political
advertising, the big parties were buying news articles and
news time on television. In our trips out to the regions, we
have been told that the amount of money Regions has available
to put into its campaign is a major benefit. Former Donetsk
allies Serhiy Taruta and Vitaliy Haiduk also told us that
Regions had a lot of money to spend. In Cherkasy, the CVU
representative and a local journalist claimed that the
Regions was using its money to pay factory managers and
school administrators, who in turn are supposed to encourage
their workers/students to vote for Regions.

Administrative Resources: Yushchenko's....
--------------


7. (C) The use of government resources by high-ranking
government officials to benefit their parties' campaigns is
an issue that arises before every Ukrainian election although
CVU Head Popov told the press that so far they are being used
less this round. For example, Regions members, PACE, ODIHR,
and some Ukrainian observers have criticized Yushchenko for
directing many of his appointed governors to run the OU-PSD
campaign in their oblasts. In theory, as party members, each
governor has the right to be involved in the campaign, but
many have been accused of using budget money and other office
materials in support of OU-PSD's cause. An additional
concern is that the presidentially-appointed governors and
raion heads will put pressure on other officials, including
at the polling station commissions (PSC) and district
election commissions (DEC),to give advantages to OU-PSD.


8. (C) OU-PSD campaign manager and Presidential Secretariat
Head Baloha reportedly has tight control over the election at
the national and regional level and predicted replacements of
several governors -- Deputy Secretariat Head Bondar was named
acting governor of Dnipropetrovsk on September 3 -- could be
an effort to increase control over governors' actions and
pressure them to assist in the election. This strategy could
backfire, however, given that many of the governors are
politically unpopular, and sometimes resented as KYIVians
sent into the oblast. We also heard from the OU party leader
in Odesa that some OU regional headquarters resent Baloha's
micromanaging (ref D).


9. (C) Without a doubt, Yushchenko has taken advantage of
free advertising available to him as president. In
announcing his social program, Yushchenko put up hundreds of
billboards around the country and ran television ads
outlining his vision -- an effort that began in July just
prior to the kick-off of the election campaign season. All
of these feature only the President and do not include any
reference to Our Ukraine or any other party. They were all
paid for by the state because they are considered to be
public service announcements. Conveniently, Yushchenko's
program ties in with what OU-PSD has put forward in its
election platform and they were featured prominantly in at
the OU-PSD party congress.

KYIV 00002247 003 OF 005



Yanukovych's...
--------------


10. (C) The Cabinet is also openly involved in the election
process. ODIHR noted in a September 7 preelection briefing
that all members of the Cabinet are traveling around the
country campaigning while also working on official business.
Justice Minister Lavrynovych has used his ministerial powers
for political means, approving the falsified party stamp in
the Pora controversy (ref E),and apparently helping to stir
up an old controversy surrounding exiled Russian oligarch
Boris Berezovskiy's provision of funds to Yushchenko's 2004
presidential campaign. Deputy PM Azarov's participation in
the extraordinary Rada session (ref F) also showed the
Cabinet's active support for Regions' campaign. PACE and
ODIHR have criticized the politicization of the CEC, singling
out Regions' use of its majority to delay registration of
BYuT (ref G),tampering with Pora's membership in OU-PSD, and
efforts to approve a form for home voting that does not
require a medical reason for requesting the mobile ballot
box.

...And Everyone Else's
--------------


11. (C) Officials on the local level probably will have the
most influence on polling stations, giving all parties
advantages in different regions. In the east, Regions
dominates many local councils and mayors, while BYuT has
strongholds across the center and parts of the west, as does
OU. This also helps some of the smaller parties. For
example, one political analyst told us that in certain areas
in central Ukraine there are strongholds of the Viche party,
whose leader Inna Bohoslovska is now number 4 on the
Regions's list. We have also heard that this phenomenon
could help the Socialists on voting day. In past elections,
we have heard stories of appointed and elected officials
sitting in polling stations on voting day, even though this
is illegal.

Political projects
--------------


12. (C) Another trick used by big parties in past elections
is the funding of marginal parties to confuse voters into
giving their votes to parties with similar names that have no
chance, such as the Communist Party (reformed) and the
Ukrainian People's Bloc. Most of these parties are unlikely
to have significant impact, but Popov agreed that they could
attract votes on the margins. For example, he said that the
Suprun Bloc -- a new version of the pro-Kuchma People's
Democratic Party that had all but gone out of existence --
seems very well-funded and has been engaged in a heavy
advertising campaign in Crimea, presumably to strip votes
away from PSPU and Regions. KUCHMA could also be aimed at
Regions. One political analyst, Vadim Karasyov, said that he
believed someone in Regions was backing Lytvyn's Bloc,
presumably to entice undecided centrists away from BYuT and
OU-PSD.

Voting Day Abuses:
--------------


13. (C) One of the problems with the election may be
disorganization and confusion, stemming in large part to
changes to the parliamentary election law (PEL) and the
shorter-than-normal campaign cycle. CEC Chairman Shapoval
glumly noted to the Ambassador September 7 that one side
changed the election law intentionally for a specific reason,
a reference to the coalition-penned PEL put forward on June 1
and supported by 251 MPs, after an opposition-backed PEL was
rejected. The amendments to the PEL have already raised
questions and could cause problems that will enable parties
to file court challenges after the election if they are
unhappy with the outcome. These amendments could result in
charges of disenfranchisement if people are improperly
removed from voters' lists because of mistakes made by the
Border Guards watching the border crossings; the use of
mobile ballots and the ban on absentee ballots could also
lead to people being denied the right to vote. On the fraud
side, there could be some intraparty collusion at PSCs and
DECs, where this year due to a change in the election law,
all the commissioners are from the five Rada factions -- in
the past all parties had the right to nominate some
commissioners -- removing the ability of small monitors to
closely monitor the process.

Election Fraud...
--------------

KYIV 00002247 004 OF 005




14. (C) The most worrying area for actual fraud remains the
mobile balloting box, now under looser requirements than in
2006 (ref C). Despite BYuT and OU-PSD efforts to require
voters who want to vote at home to provide medical
documentation -- not a legal requirement under the amended
PEL -- the CEC majority has resisted this step. An appeals
court ordered the CEC to review the form voters must use to
request the mobile ballot box, but the court did not instruct
the CEC specifically to add a requirement for a doctor's
note, just to reconsider the issue and provide instructions
to the PSCs. CEC Chairman Shapoval said that the form will
approved by September 14, but it will not make the opposition
happy. In Shapoval's view, the ability of the CEC to agree
on a new form is constrained by the law, which does not ask
for a medical certification for at-home voters. Observers
are allowed to travel with mobile ballot boxes, but it is a
time-intensive effort, and in most cases boxes travel at
least part of the day unsupervised, which could allow extra
ballots to be cast unseen. Both ODIHR and PACE have
expressed concern that loose restrictions on mobile balloting
could lead to falsification. Shapoval said another concern
was that if too many people request the mobile ballot box,
the PSCs will be overwhelmed. For example, it takes 20
minutes to bring the box to one voter -- if 200 people in one
district request the box, the PSC would have to spend the
whole day just collecting at-home ballots, which is
unrealistic. Moreover, because the law removed the
requirement for verification, someone could register people
for the mobile box without their knowledge, causing them to
be struck from the PSC lists -- if they show up to vote, they
will be out of luck. A representative of IRI told us that
their contacts claimed Regions officials were calling voters
in the East and telling them they had already been signed up
to vote at home.


15. (C) A number of political activists have also expressed
great concern to us that parties may resort to getting voting
results thrown out for certain polling stations both during
the counting phase and later through court appeals. For
example, the election law says that a PSC commission may
invalidate the results at their station if damage is done to
the box that makes it impossible to tell if the number of
ballots cast is 20 percent more than the number of registered
voters. A USAID election implementer told us that spilling
ink into the box was one way to ruin a large number of
ballots and have them thrown out. There were accusations in
2006 that the major parties used these tricks to invalidate
polling station results in areas where smaller parties were
close to the three-percent threshold -- such as PSPU,
Kostenko-Plyushch Bloc, and Pora-PRP -- to keep their
national numbers under three percent. Marginal parties could
be targeted again to keep the total number of parties getting
into the Rada down to four.


16. (C) The USAID implementer added that it was not necessary
to have the complicity of a whole polling station commission
to commit fraud or dirty tricks. Commissioners sit in pairs
at different tables, with different voter lists and piles of
ballots. Collusion between two would be enough to ruin
ballots or play with the voter list, for example.

...Versus Election Flawed
--------------


17. (C) Problems with voter lists continues to be a source of
concern. Although the Rada passed a progressive law in the
spring calling for a national voter registry, there has not
been enough time to establish this registry. Therefore, DECs
and PSCs are still primarily responsible for ensuring that
their lists are accurate; accidental misspellings and other
minor errors could prevent voters from being allowed to vote.
Moreover, the PEL amendment calling on the Border Guards to
enter into the voter lists system the names of people out of
the country three days before the election has created
confusion and uneven implementation. Voters leaving the
country are supposed to submit a form to the Border Guards
and a second one when they return, but not all border guard
points are computerized, according to one USAID implementer.
Shapoval told the Ambassador that the CEC and Border Guards
were having trouble figuring out how to make the system work;
personally, he was hoping the Constitutional Court would
strike this provision from the law, as President Yushchenko
had requested. ODIHR said that their long-term monitors in
Sumy had been denied access to border crossing points. Popov
said that this issue could result in another 200,000 losing
the right to vote; Shapoval also believed people would be
unfairly removed from voter lists.


18. (C) In addition, the new ban on absentee ballots may

KYIV 00002247 005 OF 005


limit parties from finding enough observers. Parties are a
major source of domestic observation, but in the past they
bussed observers into regions where they did not have a
natural base of support. It may be harder to find people
willing to travel, now that they will be unable to vote. For
example, the orange team told IRI that they will send 3,000
observers to Donetsk and 1,500 to Luhansk, depriving those
4,500 people of the right to vote. Coalition parties could
face the same problem in sending observers west. ODIHR also
expressed concern that the lack of an absentee ballot will
disenfranchise many university students.

Parties Will Provide Some Checks, but not Enough
-------------- ---


19. (C) All analysts we have spoken with thought that, to
some degree, the mutual suspicion and competition between
OU-PSD and BYuT will force them to serve as checks on each
other, limiting the amount of manipulation in the West and
parts of the Center. Political observers have been more
concerned about the East, where they thought there were
areas, especially outside major cities, where Regions is in
full control and can act with impunity. Popov said that it
was at the local level where fraud, if it happens, will take
place. Therefore what matters is who runs city and raion
councils and administrations not what happens in KYIV.

Court Appeals Can Also Muddy Waters
--------------


20. (C) Everyone we have spoken with -- from Regions oligarch
Akhmetov to the political analysts to ODIHR -- told us that
the numerous court appeals likely to be filed before and
after the vote will throw up roadblocks, and slow the vote
count and seating of the new Rada. A large number of cases
filed before the election could clog the system and block
important cases from being heard in a timely fashion.
According to an ODIHR legal analyst, 39 election-related
cases have already been filed since the campaign began on
August 1. Moreover, all agree that there will certainly be a
large number of court cases filed in October to contest the
election results. Akhmetov told the Ambassador September 4
that BYuT in particular will use the judicial system to have
results thrown out in pro-Regions areas.


21. (C) According to CVU Head Popov, he has talked to the
heads of the legal departments for Regions (Yuriy
Miroshnychenko) and OU-PSD (Mykola Katerynchuk) -- and both
were already preparing legal actions for various election
scenarios. Popov and Ihor Kohut, head of the Agency for
Legislative Initiatives NGO, were both worried that a worst
case scenario was that a large number of court battles would
result in the elections being annulled and no parliament
being seated. They also warned that 151 MP-elects could
object to the elections and refuse to take their seats,
causing a repeat of the current situation. Either way,
Ukraine could see more repeat elections or a Yushchenko
presidency and caretaker Yanukovych government acting with no
parliament. Their best case scenario was that it would take
a couple of months to get through post-elections objections
and negotiations before a new government was formed and
seated.


22. (C) Also of concern is the common practice among all
major parties here of court buying -- everyone may be looking
for judges to provide favorable rulings. Popov told us that
Baloha holds sway over the Constitutional Court, which could
play a role in some decisions, such as Yushchenko's appeal of
the Border Guard provision in the PEL. Popov also related a
rumor to us that Baloha had approached one of the district
administrative courts with instructions about how to rule on
certain issues, only to be told that he was too late; Regions
had already been there with money in hand, and he should find
another court. (Comment. Apocryphal or not, this anecdote
underscores the distrust all sides view the judicial branch
with and the likelihood that multiple, contradictory rulings
will crop up after the election, confusing the outcome. End
comment.)


23. (U) Visit Embassy KYIV's classified website:
www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/kiev.
Taylor