Editor’s Note: This story was originally commissioned by the Center for Liberal Modernity (LibMod) for their online magazine Ukraine verstehen, and an abridged version was published by the center in German. It is republished with permission.
Decentralization reform, which started in 2015, brought a lot to Ukraine’s regions – more tax money, powers and responsibilities.
This fall, people all over Ukraine will choose new heads of local communities, mayors, lawmakers of towns, cities and oblasts councils. Local elections, set for Oct. 25, will become a great challenge for Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and his party Servant of the People.
Last year Zelensky won the presidential election in a landslide, taking a record 73% of the vote. His personality and the colossal level of Ukrainians’ trust allowed his Servant of the People party to win the parliamentary election with 43% of the vote, and, for the first time in Ukrainian history, form a single-party majority in the parliament.
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However, experts say, this year it will be hard for Zelensky’s party to come anywhere close to the 2019 triumph.
“A year has passed. They are mired in controversy, scandals and conflicts. Zelensky has also discredited himself making controversial appointments. So it will be hard for him and his party to win the regions. Moreover, local elections have always been about local elites and their influence,” said Anatoliy Oktysiuk, a political expert of Democracy House, a Ukrainian think-tank.
After the victory, Zelensky’s government and parliament started working in what they called “turbo-regime,” quickly adopting reformist legislation. They opened the land market, finalized the creation of the anti-corruption court, and recruited a team of young reformists in the government. However, after six months, almost all the reformists were ousted from their positions. The head of the National Bank of Ukraine resigned, saying he was under pressure from the administration. Pro-Russian ex-officials who worked under fugitive ex-President Viktor Yanukovych came back to prominence in Ukraine, and some even got high-level positions in the government and president’s office. Although people’s support of Zelensky and his party remains high, a year in power hit their ratings badly.
According to the Sociological Group Rating’s latest research, published on Sept. 9, some 44% of Ukrainians support Zelensky personally, and 25% support his party. However, the COVID-19 pandemic and the quarantine measures the central government imposed in Ukraine, with certain regions facing more restriction than others, have fueled a long-lasting conflict between Zelensky’s government and local elites. All these factors will make the October elections a cold shower for the president, Oktysiuk said.
Volodymyr Fesenko, chief political expert of the Penta Center in Kyiv, argues that Zelensky and his team do not even aim to win the majority in the regions, as they know it would be extremely hard in key cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv or Odesa, where local elites are especially strong.
“However, even with their rating decrease, Servant of the People has a good chance to lead their deputies into practically every local council in Ukraine and even form coalitions there. That is their main task and their way to influence the local authorities. This also can help to defuse tensions between local and central governments and they will place a bet on Zelensky’s popularity to do that,” Fesenko said.
Zelensky has been traveling a lot in the past months. During his first tour over the regions in 2019, Zelensky openly criticized local officials, publicly shamed them, their corruption and mismanagement, pitting himself and his team against local elites as good against evil.
“They remembered that. Now they do not want to cooperate and associate themselves with the president,” Oktysiuk said.
Some mayors have started criticizing Zelensky and challenging his government’s decisions to win political points ahead of the elections, the expert added.
Mayors of Ternopil, Cherkasy and Ivano-Frankivsk have openly disobeyed the central government’s quarantine rules and challenged them in courts. In June, Borys Filatov, the mayor of Dnipro, along with the mayors of Chernivtsi, Mykolayiv, Nova Kakhovka, Zhytomyr and Kropivnytsky, presented the new political party Propozytsia, also called the “party of mayors.”
Filatov has been actively criticizing Zelensky and the Servant of the People party.
“Volodymyr Oleksandrovych (Zelensky) made a suicidal decision to present his party branch in Dnipro to local mafia and oligarchs,” Filatov wrote on Facebook.
Research published on Aug. 28 by sociological group Ranking on political moods in Dnipro suggests Filatov has the highest support in the city — 48% are ready to reelect him.
In Dnipro, Zelensky presented Serhiy Ryzhenko, chief doctor of the local Mechnikova Hospital to challenge Filatov. Ryzhenko used to be a lawmaker in the Dnipro Oblast council, and he has not been mentioned by election watchdog Chesno as a person tied to oligarchs, unlike many of his party colleagues in Dnipro, who used to work with oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky.
Recently, Zelensky has been promoting regional Servant of the People candidates all over Ukraine.
“Of course like any other politician I would want to see as many representatives of my political force in managing positions in the regions as possible, but everything depends on people’s will. Nowadays I am not thinking of numbers and statistics. I hope Servant of the People and the members of my team could present the truly useful candidates to the local societies,” Zelensky told Ukraine Verstehen.
Zelensky sees decentralization as one of the most successful reforms in Ukraine.
“For me as a president, it is important (that) the decentralization reform continues despite anyone’s political ambitions. Our goal is to present candidates, who understand the local problems and provide effective management, uproot corruption and make life in the regions better. People will vote for these kinds of candidates,” Zelensky said.
Yevheniya Kravchuk, a deputy head of the Servant of the People parliament faction, agrees with the president.
“Our goal is the victory of changes. We formed the agenda of these elections — decentralization, strategic development of the local communities and regions. They will get more powers to solve the issues and problems of local development. They will also get a mechanism of control over the local governments, such as the power to withdraw a lawmaker,” Kravchuk said.
She insisted that all candidates of the Servant of the People party are new people, not connected to the local clans and corruption.
“We are primed for victory in all the regions. And the fact that local clans are influential and powerful in some regions doesn’t stop us,” Kravchuk said. “Of course in many cities and towns, our competitors have significant electoral, administrative and financial resources. Furthermore, Ukrainians are usually more sympathetic to the local government, and are more eager to blame the central government for all the problems – this habit has formed over the years.”
The polls somewhat back her words. For example, in Odesa, where mayor Gennady Trukhanov has been ruling over a decade despite numerous allegations of corruption and ties to organized crime, locals are more satisfied with his rule than the rule of Zelensky. According to a June poll by Sociological Group Rating, only 29% of Odesa residents are satisfied with the central government’s policies. Over 56% support Trukhanov, while some 48% support Zelensky. However, Kravchuk is confident that during the local election, the situation may change.
“We have all the chances to win in those cities where locals want change, regardless of our resourceful competitors from the current local governments,” Kravchuk said.
Reacting to analysts’ predictions, she urged not to rush with conclusions.
“Of course, the economic crisis and pandemic created a lot of problems for the people and the government. Openly populistic behavior of some local councils’ heads added some artificial bonuses to their current ratings, and even helped some of them to distract attention from their corruption,” Kravchuk said.
Experts have long been watching the growing tensions between central and local governments. However, Fesenko said, not a single party will win enough seats to create a single majority in any of the major local councils, so everybody will have to make deals and form coalitions.
Kravchuk said it was too early to talk about coalitions in the local councils. However, she predicted that the Servant of the People is strong enough to become the central force of the local politics in every region.
