Klitschko to be at the top of the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko list in the elections

Photo: Ukrainian Photo

Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko and President Petro Poroshenko decided to fulfill the agreement they reached prior to the presidential elections. The two teams will form a general electoral list for the early parliamentary elections scheduled for October 26.

Lutsenko lost out in terms of trust

As a people’s deputy of the UDAR faction told Capital on condition of anonymity, Poroshenko and Klitschko are wrapping up coordination of their positions in the upcoming election campaign. «The probability of joint participation in the elections is 95%. In principle, everything has been agreed to. Poroshenko and Klitschko simply have to iron out the details,» a source of Capital said, specifying that the discussion is about quotas on a single list.

Meanwhile it is known for a fact that the leader of the UDAR party and Mayor of Kyiv Vitaliy Klitschko will be the first on the list. A source of Capital said that the president himself announced this at a meeting with the UDAR faction last Friday. «Petro Poroshenko gathered us in order to once again confirm the agreements that were reached prior to his nomination as a candidate for the presidential office. He said the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko and UDAR are running for the elections as a united team, Klitschko is number one on the list and the interests of our factions in the distribution of spots on the list and in majoritarian constituencies will be fully taken into account,» a source of Capital present at the meeting of the head of state with parliamentarians said.

MP Volodymyr Kurenniy (UDAR) says it will be a logical step if Klitschko is given the first place in the united Bloc of Petro Poroshenko. «We believe early parliamentary elections are a continuation of the presidential campaign when one of the leaders of the Maidan Vitaliy Klitschko sacrificed his ambitions and supported Poroshenko,» Kurenniy told Capital.
As a reminder, prior to the presidential elections Klitschko and Poroshenko held talks as a result of which the leader of the UDAR party refused to run in the presidential elections in order to be elected to the post of mayor of Kyiv.

The two sides also agreed to form a general electoral list for the elections to the Kyiv City Council and early parliamentary elections if they were to be appointed. As a result, in the elections to the Kyiv City Council the members of the president’s team won half of the places on the list of UDAR. General candidates in the majoritarian constituencies were also agreed to. According to the results of the electoral race of the Kyiv City Council the UDAR-Solidarnist faction was formed with 77 deputies. The formation of a general pre-election list put pressure on the political allies as members of UDAR claimed that individuals that earlier collaborated with the team of ex-mayor of Kyiv Leonid Chernovetskiy were included in the quota of Solidarnist.

MP Yuriy Stets (Batkivshchyna), who last week ceded his place of the leader of the presidential party to Yuriy Lutsenko, told Capital that the choice of the mayor of Kyiv to lead the pre-election list is confirmed by socio-political data. «Klitschko has a much greater balance in terms of trust and distrust than Lutsenko,» Stets said.

Sources of Capital in UDAR told that in order to run in the elections on the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko candidates will suspend their membership in the party of Vitaliy Klitschko. If the truth be told, individuals that spoke with Capital could not answer the question as to whether such candidates would become members of Poroshenko’s bloc. The fact is that earlier Stets stated that those in the inner circles of the president believe that all candidates in the elections nominated by the party under his name should be issued a party ticket. UDAR is counting on the fact that after the elections its members will renew their membership in the party.

Noteworthy, such a scheme of depriving a deputy of party membership is necessary to circumvent the existing law on elections that prohibits the formation of pre-election blocs. This mechanism was successfully tested by the Batkivshchyna party during the election campaign in 2012 when a number of political forces such as the Front of Changes headed by Arseniy Yatsenyuk joined it.

Loss of self-identity

Kurenniy said that the leadership of the UDAR party will make the final decision on unification with Poroshenko this week. However, a source inside the party noted that the discussions about a union with the pro-presidential bloc continue. «There is apprehension that by merging with the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko the party may lose its self-identity and will have to assume responsibility for decisions that it did not make,» the source said.

He specified that parliamentarians are not the only ones that doubt the benefits of unification, but also leaders of regional organizations. «These are not public figures that fear that may not have a place in the next run,» an interlocutor of Capital said.

Meanwhile, the leadership of the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko is considering the possibility of variants of running in the elections with other political players. As people’s deputy Oleksandr Briginets (Batkivshchyna) told Capital, the matter is about getting on the electoral list of the presidential party and agreeing to the candidates in the constituencies. In particular, head said such talks are currently being held with the Svoboda party.