DNIPROPETROVSK, Ukraine – Lawmaker Borys Filatov decisively won the mayoral run-off election in the nation’s fourth largest city of Dnipropetrovsk on Nov. 15, garnering 62 percent of the votes, according to preliminary findings of an exit poll that was conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology on order by billionaire Ihor Kolomoisky’s 1+1 television channel.
Filatov was deputy governor of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast under Kolomoisky before being elected to parliament in October 2014. Kolomoisky, a presidential appointee, left gubernatorial chair in late May.
In his mayoral campaign, Filatov targeted pro-Ukrainian and pro-European voters. His campaign focused on promoting the Kolomoisky team’s efforts to defend Dnipropetrovsk Oblast from Russian aggression last year during the tycoon’s governorship.
Analysts say Filatov’s popularity was also boosted by the arrest of his ally Gennady Korban on organized crime, kidnapping and embezzlement charges last month – something that Korban and Filatov describe as a political vendetta by President Petro Poroshenko.
However, some pro-European voters were opposed to Filatov due to his ties to Kolomoisky’s oligarchic group.
Filatov’s opponent Oleksandr Vilkul, a former governor of the region and an ex-ally of disgraced former President Viktor Yanukovych, got 38 percent of the vote, according to the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology. He mostly catered to voters opposed to the EuroMaidan Revolution, which drove Yanukovych from power in 2014, and those favoring closer ties with Russia.
Pro-Filatov voters said they voted for him either because he represented the future or because they didn’t want to see Vilkul, as a former Yanukovych ally, back in office.
Inna Sukhogruz, a 67-year old engineer, said she voted for Filatov because she believed Vilkul to be corrupt.
Some people who chose Vilkul said they preferred him because he opposed the war in eastern Ukraine.
Vilkul’s supporters are predominantly elderly people and blue-collar workers, while Filatov’s electorate comprises younger voters and white-collar workers, Oleksandr Sanzhara, Filatov’s campaign manager, told the Kyiv Post.
Hence the difference in their campaigns, with Vilkul being more populist, he said. Given that the country’s economy is still not rebounding from a deep recession, Vilkul’s promise to double pensions is more likely to lead to a weaker hryvnia than to greater prosperity for pensioners, Sanzhara said.
“The promise to double pensions is like a promise to reduce gravity,” he said.
He also said that Filatov’s campaign had been more oriented towards frequent meetings with ordinary voters, while Vilkul had only met with professional groups like doctors and teachers.
Both candidates were accused of violating election law.
Denys Davydov, an observer of the Opora election watchdog, told the Kyiv Post that both Vilkul and Filatov had displayed billboards with hidden campaign messages on Oct. 14 and Oct. 15, when campaigning was banned.
Such billboards include ones comparing Dnipropetrovsk with war-torn Donetsk, which were seen as favoring Filatov, and ones reading “Less politics, more action” – a slogan from Vilkul’s campaign, Davydov said.
Filatov’s press office could not comment on the accusations, while Vilkul’s spokesman Serhiy Milyutin was not available for comment.
Davydov also accused Filatov of using a fair on EuroMaidan Heroes Square as a campaigning tool.
The fair was ostensibly designed to encourage people to vote by exchanging pictures of them at polling stations for mulled wine. Filatov’s press office denied that it had been used to campaign for Filatov.
Opora also said it had observed people taking photos of their ballots, which could be seen as evidence of vote buying, and a few isolated cases of ballot stuffing.
Kyiv Post staff writer Oleg Sukhov can be reached at [email protected].
