Ukraine vote on constitution amendments possible soon, president says

Ukraine’s parliament could approve the first reading on a package of amendments to the Ukrainian Constitution in the upcoming weeks, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko told a June 11 press conference during his visit to the strategic port of city of Mariupol, on the front lines of the Donbas war. The amendments will transfer significant authority to local governments, he said. Local elections will be held throughout the country on Oct. 25, he said, with the exception of the occupied territories of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, for which the president said he’s unsure.

The Poroshenko Bloc has the support of 21 percent of voters who have decided to participate in the October local elections, according to a poll released on June 11 conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology. The Self-Reliance party led by outspoken activist Yegor Sobolyev has 16 percent support, the Fatherland Party led by former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has 15 percent support, the Radical Party of Oleh Liashko has 12 percent support, the pro-Russian Opposition Bloc has 10 percent support and the Civic Position party led by former Defense Minister Anatoliy Hrytsenko has 5 percent support. The poll was conducted of 2,022 respondents between May 19 and 29.

Zenon Zawada: We expect decentralization will be a key feature of the constitutional amendments, which is directly tied to the local elections. With the president knowing his party will gain the most votes, the Poroshenko Bloc in parliament will most certainly support measures to transfer greater authority to regional and city councils, the majority of which will be dominated by his party.

Yet the bigger question is whether the president will be able to muster the necessary 300 votes in parliament to support the amendments. We expect five of the six parties with factions in parliament to vote in favor, which amounts to 255 votes.

Yet the second-biggest parliamentary faction, the People’s Front led by Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, is barely on the radar screen of polls. Therefore, we expect the People’s Front to be opposed to the amendments, and then use that position to campaign for the local elections, arguing that decentralization threatens national security.

It’s possible that not enough votes will be mustered to support the amendments. Yet the Poroshenko Bloc can use that in its campaign as well, under the claim that we wanted to distribute power locally but our opponents undermined these efforts.

A big surprise revealed by this poll is the sudden surge in support for Tymoshenko. She has been among the vocal critics of the rise in utility rates, particularly natural gas, which gave her a boost in popularity in the last few months. Tymoshenko has demonstrated that she still has political capital and remains a top competitor to the president.