Sadovyi ends presidential run to endorse Grytsenko

Andriy Sadovyi, the mayor of Lviv and head of the
Self-Reliance party, announced on March 1 that he is ending his presidential
campaign on behalf of candidate Anatoliy Grytsenko. He endorsed his rival at a
press briefing, stating they will sign an agreement this week on their common
principles on defense and security, the occupied territories, fighting
corruption and personnel policy. “If I don’t do this now and we lose the
elections, then the entire fallout for not using the opportunity to support
Grytsenko will lie on us all,” he told reportedly told a March 1 meeting of his
party’s political council, as reported by the pravda.com.ua news site. At the
same time, the Self-Reliance party will compete independently in the October
parliamentary elections and local elections next year, Sadovyi told the press
briefing. In response, Grytsenko thanked Sadovyi for his sacrifice and
endorsement on his Facebook page.

Zenon Zawada: In his decision, Sadovyi was responding
to demands from Ukraine’s pro-Western advocates to help produce a competitive
Euro-Atlantic presidential candidate who doesn’t have the enormous baggage of
the current leading contenders. Poroshenko and Tymoshenko have been bombarded with corruption accusations,
including accusing each other of vote-buying,
while the shock candidacy of Volodymyr Zelenskiy has sent chills down the
spines of Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantic advocates. 

But unfortunately, this is another case of too little,
too late in these elections. Grytsenko had impressive numbers in the fall, when
he was among the Top Three presidential contenders. A Grytsenko-Sadovyi
alliance was being urged then, but never materialized, partly out of Sadovyi’s
own political ambitions. Grytsenko’s candidacy has lost momentum since then,
and Sadovyi’s endorsement won’t help him recover.

Grytsenko has 6.4% support among decided Ukrainians
who will vote in the March 31 elections, while Sadovyi had 2.4% in the poll
released on Feb. 25. Assuming they won’t lose voters as a result of their
alliance, their combined 8.8% doesn’t help Grytsenko qualify among the top four
candidates. The third-leading candidate, Yulia Tymoshenko, has 13.8% support,
while the fourth-ranked candidate, Yuriy Boyko, has 10.9%, according to the
poll conducted between Feb. 8 and 20 of 2,042 respondents by the Kyiv
International Institute of Sociology.