Members of the pro-presidential Party of Regions in some parts of the nation are not eager to tout their party affiliation in the Oct. 28 parliamentary elections.
It appears they fear that playing up their ties will cost votes.
Although the election campaign started only July 30, prospective candidates long ago started awareness campaigns. In one example, billboards promoting Maksym Lutsky, a Party of Regions lawmaker, did not mention his party affiliation.
Taras Berezovets, director of the political consulting firm Berta Communications, says that with the growing unpopularity of President Viktor Yanukovych and his ruling party, distancing is understandable.
According to a June poll by the Razumkov Center, the party in the center and northern oblasts has only 14 percent support compared to 27 percent who support imprisoned former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s Batkivshchyna Party. During the presidential vote on Feb. 7, 2010, Tymoshenko got 65 percent of the votes in Kyiv Oblast.
Yet a Razumkov Center poll in June shows that the Party of Regions remains the most popular party nationwide with 21 percent support.
Berezovets says he saw many such examples of candidates obscuring their Party of Regions’ connections in southern Ukraine.
Also, in Kyiv, where Lutsky is planning to run for parliament on a single-mandate district, the Party of Regions is not popular. Lutsky could not be reached for comment.
Two other Party of Regions lawmakers in the parliament – Valeriy Borysov and Ihor Lysov – are following suit. Banners of their campaign have appeared in different parts of Kyiv, but neither of them bore any mention that they are members of the pro-presidential party.
âI will be running for parliament not on the banner of Party of Regions, because I do not want to capitalize on the image of my party,â he explained. âI would run as independent there even if my party had a 40 percent approval rating.â— Orest Muts, Party of Regions deputy
Borysov could not be reached for comment while Lysov confirmed that he is running in a single mandate constituency, endorsed by the Party of Regions. He told the Kyiv Post that he was not using his party’s logo before he is officially registered as a candidate, but promised to make it clear to voters that he is a Party of Regions member.
“There is no reason to be ashamed,” Lysov said.
Apparently, some of his party colleagues seem to not share that view. At least two other Regions Party deputies seem to be unhappy about the party’s legislative initiatives ahead of election.
The electronic voting cards of Orest Muts and Vasyl Chudnov, both pro-presidential party lawmakers, were used to vote in support of the controversial language bill on July 3 which enhances the status of the Russia language. But the deputies rushed to declare that they are against the law and asked not to count their votes.
In a telephone interview with the Kyiv Post, Muts said he will run for parliament in western Ternopil Oblast as an independent.
“I will be running for parliament not on the banner of Party of Regions, because I do not want to capitalize on the image of my party,” he explained. “I would run as independent there even if my party had a 40 percent approval rating.”
Muts also made it clear that he is strongly against the language bill, which was proposed by his faction colleagues. But he noted that he does not plan to quit the party in protest.
Kyiv Post staff writer Yuriy Onyshkiv can be reached at [email protected]
