Oleh Lyashko, a scandalous former lawmaker and leader of the populist Radical Party, has lost a special parliamentary election in a single-member constituency in Chernihiv Oblast, the Central Electoral Commission reported on Oct. 28.
In total, 199 seats out of the current 424 in Ukraine’s parliament are held by single-member constituency winners. By losing this election, Lyashko lost his chance to return to parliament as a lawmaker.
Lyashko lost the seat to Anatoliy Gunko, a member of the ruling Servant of the People party. The Radical Party leader received 31.7% of the votes, while his opponent managed to defeat him with 34.1% support.
In 2019, Lyashko’s Radical Party ran in the parliamentary elections but lost, failing to pass the 5% threshold required to gain seats in parliament. Before the defeat, Lyashko had been a lawmaker for 13 years since 2006.
After the 2019 vote, he said that he would return to politics.
The special election was held on Oct. 25, the day that Ukraine held local elections, because the winner of the 2019 race, Valeriy Davidenko, had died. Independent lawmaker Davidenko was found dead in his office in Kyiv in May.
Davidenko’s widow Lyudmyla ran in the special election and came in third with 26.6%.
Immediately after the election, Lyashko declared himself the winner, but when the first exit-polls showed him losing to Gunko, he accused the authorities of “stealing his victory.”
Ultimately, he accepted the defeat, but accused his rival of buying votes and asked the police to investigate this. Gunko, in turn, accused Lyashko of putting pressure on the members of the electoral committee.
Scandal-maker Lyashko
Lyashko is one of the most extravagant politicians the Ukrainian parliament has ever seen. A former journalist, Lyashko loved being in the spotlight and on television — and he would often put on a show.
In 2012, the Radical Party leader kissed a handful of Ukrainian soil in protest against plans to lift the longstanding moratorium on farmland sale in Ukraine. It was ultimately lifted in 2020.
In 2016, Lyashko walked to the Cabinet of Ministers building surrounded by dozens of cows to advocate for increasing milk prices and protest against the agrarian policy of the government.
He then kissed a cow and said: “They smell so good. A cow’s smell is the smell of my childhood.”
As a lawmaker, Lyashko was infamous for getting involved in public fist fights with his political opponents. In November 2019, Lyashko punched Servant of the People lawmaker Andriy Gerus.
Lyashko accused Gerus, who heads the energy committee in parliament, of lobbying on behalf of Russian interests. Before that, on Oct. 1, Gerus introduced an amendment that allowed Ukraine to resume imports of electricity from Russia and Belarus.
Gerus, in turn, accused Lyashko of lobbying the interests of Rinat Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest oligarch, who is a major producer of electricity in the country through his DTEK company.
In his most recent years in parliament, Lyashko was seen by many as a vocal lobbyist for Akhmetov. He has denied that.
Lyashko campaigned for the 2020 election in his usual, extravagant style — again putting on a show.
He recorded a 5-minute music video called “Don’t back down.” In it, he plays a superhero who saves the planet from a villain and then celebrates his victory by dancing with Ukrainian grannies next to a hayloft.
But the local elections were a wash for both Lyashko and his Radical Party, which ran for the Kyiv City Council with Lyashko’s wife Rosita at the top of the party’s list of candidates.
Although official results haven’t been published yet, according to exit polls, the party didn’t pass the 5% threshold.
