Official parliamentary election campaign begins tomorrow

The decree of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy
to dismiss parliament and set early elections for July 21 took effect this
morning on May 23, having been published in the state media. The official
election campaign begins the next day according to the Central Election
Commission, as reported by the pravda.com.ua news site.

The president’s decree dismissing parliament violates
the Ukrainian Constitution and will be appealed by several MPs in the
Constitutional Court, said on May 22 Andriy Parubiy, the parliamentary speaker.
He said parliament doesn’t have the authority to challenge the decree, only the
courts.

The People’s Servant party led by Zelenskiy would gain
a dominating parliamentary faction if elections were held today, according to a
poll released on May 22 by the Rating Sociological Group. About 37% of
Ukrainians who intend to vote will cast their ballot for the president’s party,
followed by 8.9% for the pro-Russian Opposition Platform For Life party, 7.4%
for the Solidarity Poroshenko Bloc and 6.2% for the Fatherland party led by Yulia
Tymoshenko. The poll was conducted between May 16 and 21 among 2,000
respondents.

Zenon Zawada: The
election campaign will begin tomorrow regardless of the appeal in the
Constitutional Court, which is more of a symbolic gesture since it won’t halt the
elections, even if it determines the decree to be in violation of the
Constitution.

As for the polls, we expect much can change in the
next two months. We offer the following certainties about the parliamentary
elections, if they’re held on July 21 (which is highly likely): (a) the People’s
Servant party will get a dominating result; (b) the anti-IMF Fatherland party
will qualify; (c) at least one pro-Russian party will qualify; (d) both a
pro-Western and pro-Russian opposition will emerge to Zelenskiy’s coalition
government, which will styled as “centrist” and “pragmatic.”