ELECTORAL SPLIT

The elections to the regional, city and district councils, as well as of mayors of Ukrainian cities were for the first time held in accordance with the new electoral law. In particular, the law provides that in small towns with a population of less than 90,000 people, mayors are to be elected by a simple majority of votes, while in big cities, there will be a second round if no candidate wins more than 50 per cent of the vote.

A characteristic feature of the elections to Ukraine's local governments was quite a low turnout - just over 46 per cent of the voters out of the 29 million citizens eligible to vote. Furthermore, many Ukrainians who came to the polling stations, deliberately spoiled ballot papers. Such "protest apathy" seemingly reflected the lack of people's confidence in the entire political class of Ukraine, which had been unable to formulate a common strategy of national development and reaffirm its commitment to nationwide rather than narrow group interests over the whole period of independence of the modern state. Be that as it may, the local elections were recognized as having taken place because the Ukrainian legislation does not set a minimum threshold for the voter turnout.

The election results have generally confirmed electoral preferences at the level of Ukraine's regions. Residents of the western part of the country mainly supported right-wing nationalist parties, including the Svoboda (Freedom) party led by Oleh Tyahnybok. The south-eastern regions again came out as the opposition to the central authorities in Kiev. Meanwhile, the centre itself showed, as before, no attachment to any particular party, having distributed its sympathies among the major political actors in Ukraine.

The elections have shown that the Petro Poroshenko Bloc (PPB) still remains the most popular force. According to preliminary data, the president's supporters have won in 14 regions and in the capital, finished second in another five regions and, unlike their rivals, received mandates in almost all local councils, whether in the west, centre or east of the country (of course, with the exception of certain non-voting regions of Donbass, namely, the Donetsk and Luhansk regions).

In the meantime, the party of power has received a disturbing signal from the public: growing dissatisfaction with the policies of President Poroshenko and his followers has resulted in the strengthening of positions of the Opposition Bloc, which is considered a kind of successor to the successor to ex-president Viktor Yanukovych's Party of Regions that sunk into oblivion. The Opposition Bloc has achieved success in a number of districts in the southeast. However, experts believe this is unlikely to lead to a significant strengthening of its influence on the ground, since most of the seats in the councils, in which the Opposition Bloc finished first, went to representatives of the PPB and other forces that make up the core of Maidan's system of authority.

Among the factors that make one reflect on the results of the elections to the local authorities in Ukraine is the strengthening of positions of the far-right wing Freedom party - a sign of growing nationalist sentiments against the backdrop of the unresolved conflict in the Donbass. In addition, one can note that the Popular Front led by Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk has voluntarily put itself "out of play". This movement, which won parliamentary elections exactly a year ago, decided not to take part in local elections. Evidently, the reason for self-withdrawal of the Popular Front has to do with the drop in popularity of Yatsenyuk, who may even be expected to resign as the head of government. It is possible that such a decision will be adopted by the Coalition Council consisting of the four factions that make up the parliamentary majority. According to MP Mykola Tomenko, who represents the PPB in the Verkhovna Rada [parliament], the rating of Arseniy Yatsenyuk and his Popular Front has dropped to one per cent. "Yatsenyuk's government has nothing to boast about - either to the world or to its own people," Tomenko said.

The root cause for the decline in Yatsenyuk's rating is believed to be the failure of economic policy implemented by his Cabinet. Yuriy Lutsenko, the leader of the PPB faction in the Verkhovna Rada, said: "We will have a very tough discussion with the prime minister. I think we can anticipate major changes in the Cabinet, even comprehensive ones, already in November". Lutsenko thinks that "Yatsenyuk has to answer for the policy in the sphere of housing and communal services, for errors in the indexation of pensions and salaries".

Given that the PPB has secured support of as little as 20 per cent of the vote, even though the president's party has won the majority in most of the regions, it can be assumed that early parliamentary elections will be held in Ukraine in the near future. Therefore, experts do not rule out the possibility that Poroshenko, in order to maintain the popularity of his party, will put the entire responsibility for the drawbacks of government policy on the prime minister. This is openly stated by Popular Front representatives, in whose opinion attempts to expose Yatsenyuk as the only scapegoat is "not quite a fair play on the part of Poroshenko's associates" because the president and the prime minister "worked as a team and carried out reforms in coordination".

Meanwhile, Yatsenyuk's resignation is also demanded by other influential forces, in particular, the Radical Party, which withdrew from the ruling coalition after the bloody clashes in Kiev caused by a discussion in parliament of the issue of granting special status to the Donbass. The leader of the radicals, Oleh Lyashko, believes that the need for the prime minister's resignation is obvious. "It seems that Yatsenyuk himself understands the inevitability of his departure, in connection with which he sharply tightened the tone of his statements, including against Russia. This will allow him to later claim that he was removed because of his patriotism," Lyashko said.

Thus, the local elections held in Ukraine are another step towards the formation of the system of authority of Maidan that came out victorious a year and a half ago. At the same time, they confirmed the split of the Ukrainian society on a number of key issues concerning further development of the country, including on the status of rebellious Donbass, which involves processes that leave hope for a peaceful resolution of the Ukrainian crisis.