Elections in Ukraine are held to choose the president (head of state), Verkhovna Rada (legislature), and local governments. Referendums may be held on special occasions. Ukraine has a multi-party system: often no single party has a chance of gaining power alone, and parties must work with each other to form coalition governments.
Latest election 2019 Ukrainian parliamentary election
2019 Ukrainian presidential election
Result in history 1994 Ukrainian parliamentary election
1998 Ukrainian parliamentary election
2012 Ukrainian parliamentary election
2014 Ukrainian parliamentary election
Legislation
Elections in Ukraine are held to choose the President (head of state) and Verkhovna Rada (legislature). The Ukrainian constitution does not allow holding Verkhovna Rada elections while martial law is in effect. The president is elected for a five-year term. The Verkhovna Rada has 450 members and is also elected for a five-year term, but may be dissolved earlier by the president in the case of a failure to form a government.Q&A: Ukrainian parliamentary election, BBC News (23 October 2012) Law of Ukraine "On Elections of People's Deputies of Ukraine " dated 17 November 2011, Verkhovna Rada The next election to the Verkhovna Rada, set to be held after the end of martial law due to the Russo-Ukrainian War, Early to rejoice? Regular parliamentary elections may take place under Yanukovych's law, Civil movement "Chesno" (11 July 2019) will be, for the first time, with different regional open lists (with again an electoral threshold of five percent) and a return, and thus abolition of the constituencies with first-past-the-post voting, to only one national constituency.Electoral Code becomes effective in Ukraine, Interfax-Ukraine (1 January 2010)
From 2012 until the 2019 Ukrainian parliamentary election the Verkhovna Rada was elected using a mixed election system. Half of the representatives were elected from national closed party lists distributed between the parties using the Hare quota with a 5% threshold. The remaining half were elected from constituencies using first-past-the-post voting. This system was adopted for the 2012 elections and was also used for the 2014 election, as a new draft law moving to electing all members using open party lists failed to gather necessary support in the Rada. According to current law, the next election to the Verkhovna Rada will again be without single-member constituencies and instead deputies can only be elected on a party list in one nationwide constituency with a 5% election threshold with open regional lists of candidates for deputies.
A snap poll must have a voter turnout higher than 50%.
Ukraine's election law forbids outside financing of political parties or campaigns.Hacked PR documents accelerate political war, Kyiv Post (11 January 2013)
Presidential candidates must have had residence in Ukraine for the past ten years prior to election day.Vitali Klitschko says intends to run for president in Ukraine, Interfax-Ukraine (24 October 2013)Parliament passes law that could prevent Klitschko from running for president, Interfax-Ukraine (24 October 2013)
Since late February 2016 a party congress is allowed to remove any candidate from its party list before the Central Election Commission recognizes him or her elected. Meaning that parties after elections can prevent their candidates to take a seat in parliament that they were entitled to due to their place on the party list.Poroshenko signs notorious 'party dictatorship' law, Ukraine Today (25 February 2016) Lyashko advantage of the law on "party dictatorship", Ukrayinska Pravda (3 March 2016) A party is (since late February 2016) also allowed to excluded people from its electoral list of the last parliamentary elections. CEC excluded from party list Lyashko 10 candidates for people's deputies, Ukrayinska Pravda (18 December 2016)
In Ukraine political campaigning outside election campaign periods is prohibited. But this prohibition is widely ignored in election years and perpetraters are seldom punished since political parties use loopholes in election law.Campaign false start: who is already advertised in the Dnipro, Civil movement "Chesno" (26 August 2020)
Local elections
Under the Constitution of Ukraine, the term of office of the heads of villages and towns and the council members of these villages and towns is five years.CEC member: Kyiv City Council to be elected for five years in upcoming election, Interfax-Ukraine (16 February 2013)
Past legislation The parliamentary election law has been changed four times from 1991 to 2015.Experts: Proposed election law casts cloud over next year’s parliamentary contest, Kyiv Post (October 3, 2011) Before 1998 all the members of the Parliament were elected by single-seat constituencies (from each electoral district). In 1998 and in 2002 half of the members were elected by proportional representation (faction vote) and the other half by single-seat constituencies. In the 2006 and 2007 parliamentary election, all 450 members of the Verkhovna Rada were elected by party-list proportional representation with closed listsUnderstanding Ukrainian Politics: Power, Politics, And Institutional Design by Paul D'Anieri, M.E. Sharpe, 2006, (page 251)Black Sea Fleet vote: Know thy turncoats, Kyiv Post (May 6, 2010)Ukraine needs constitutional change now, Kyiv Post (May 7, 2009) (the same goes for local elections).Parliament rejects bill on local elections under open lists, Kyiv Post (July 1, 2010)
In the 2010 Ukrainian local elections four years was set for the office of the heads of villages and towns and the council members of these villages and towns.European Parliament EU-Ukraine PCC Members' delegation to Ukraine observing local and regional elections of 31 October 2010, European Parliament (10 November 2010)
Voting patterns Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Communist Party of Ukraine politically dominated most of Ukraine. By mid 1990s the communists completely lost popularity in western Ukraine, which voted for any representative but communist. Since Leonid Kuchma left presidential post, in 2004 support for the Communist Party shifted towards the Party of Regions being politically dominating mostly over the southeastern Ukraine. At the same time initially led by the People's Movement of Ukraine, political leadership in the non-communist camp was taken over by Our Ukraine bloc and Bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko.
In the elections since 2002 voters of Western and Central Ukrainian oblasts voted mostly for parties (Our Ukraine, Batkivshchyna, UDAR, Self Reliance, Radical Party, Petro Poroshenko Bloc and the People's Front) and presidential candidates (Viktor Yushchenko, Yulia Tymoshenko) with a pro-Western and state reform platform, while voters in Southern and Eastern oblasts of Ukraine voted for parties (CPU, Party of Regions and Opposition Bloc) and presidential candidates (Viktor Yanukovych) with a pro-Russian and status quo platform.Центральна виборча комісія України - WWW відображення ІАС "Вибори народних депутатів України 2012" Communist and Post-Communist Parties in Europe by Uwe Backes and Patrick Moreau, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008, (page 396)Ukraine right-wing politics: is the genie out of the bottle?, openDemocracy.net (January 3, 2011)Eight Reasons Why Ukraine’s Party of Regions Will Win the 2012 Elections by Taras Kuzio, The Jamestown Foundation (17 October 2012)UKRAINE: Yushchenko needs Tymoshenko as ally again by Taras Kuzio, Oxford Analytica (5 October 2007)After the parliamentary elections in Ukraine: a tough victory for the Party of Regions , Centre for Eastern Studies (7 November 2012) Although this geographical division is decreasing.Election winner lacks strong voter mandate, Kyiv Post (February 11, 2010)Ukraine's Party of Regions: A pyrrhic victory, EurActiv.com (16 November 2012)Ukraine vote ushers in new constellation of power, Deutsche Welle (30 October 2012) Till the 2014 Ukrainian parliamentary election the electorate of CPU and Party of Regions was very loyal to them. But in the 2014 parliamentary election Party of Regions did not to participate (because of a perceived lack of legitimacy (of the election), because not every resident of the Donbas could vote) and the CPU came 1.12% short of the 5% election threshold.General official results of Rada election, Interfax-Ukraine (11 November 2014)Central Election Commission announces official results of Rada election on party tickets, Interfax-Ukraine (11 November 2014)Ukraine's Party of Regions Refuses to Participate in Rada Elections, RIA Novosti (23 September 2014) The results were a victory for the pro-Western parties and a major defeat for the pro-Russian camp.
A 2010 study by the Institute of Social and Political Psychology of Ukraine found that in general, Yulia Tymoshenko supporters are more optimistic compared with Viktor Yanukovych supporters. 46 percent of the Tymoshenko's backers expect improvement in their well-being in the next year compared to 30 percent for Yanukovych.Disappointment, pessimism high among nation’s voters, Kyiv Post (January 15, 2010)
Parliamentary elections by party list
by constituency
Presidential elections
Voter turnout From 1994 to 2007 the average voter turnout for the Verkhovna Rada elections was 68.13%Central Election Commission of Ukraine The total voter turnout in the 2012 parliamentary elections was then the lowest ever with 57.99%;CEC:Turnout in Ukraine's parliamentary elections 57.99%, Kyiv Post (29 October 2012) The lowest turnout in these elections was in Crimea (with 49.46%), the highest in Lviv Oblast (67.13%). In the 2014 parliamentary elections the official voter turnout was set (by the Central Election Commission of Ukraine) at 52.42%.Voter turnout at Rada election 52.42% at all 198 constituencies - CEC, Interfax-Ukraine (27 October 2014) This figure was determined after the Central Electoral Commission deducted the eligible voters in areas were voting was impossible. Because of the War in Donbas and the unilateral annexation of Crimea by Russia, the 2014 parliamentary elections were not held in Crimea and also not held in parts of Donetsk Oblast and Luhansk Oblast. The lowest turnout in these elections was in Donetsk Oblast (with 32.4%), the highest in again in Lviv Oblast (70%).Voter turnout at Rada election 52.42% at all 198 constituencies , National Radio Company of Ukraine (27 October 2014) According to Tadeusz Olszański, of the Centre for Eastern Studies, the low turnout in Donetsk Oblast (and also Luhansk Oblast) is explained by the end of an artificial increase of voter turnout there by Party of Regions officials.