Development of concept of improvement of local election legislation to ensure proportional representation

1. DEVELOPMENT OF CONCEPT OF IMPROVEMENT
OF LOCAL ELECTION LEGISLATION
TO ENSURE
PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION
Yevgen Poberezhny
Elections and Governance Officer
OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine

2. 1. Distortion of the constitutional principle of representation of local
communities. Article 140 of the Constitution of Ukraine: “Rayon and
oblast councils shall be the bodies of local self-government
representing the common interests of territorial communities of
villages, settlements, and cities”
2. Noncompliance with international standards, in particular with principle
of equal suffrage of the Code of Good Practice in Electoral Matters of
the Venice Commission: “The permissible departure from the norm <of
representation> should not be more than 10%, and should certainly not
exceed 15%”
Problems of acting legislation

3. Representation of cities of oblast significance and
rayons in oblast councils
not represented (no deputies elected) - 48
represented in accordance with number of electoral districts – 182
number of deputies is less than number of districts – 151
number of deputies is higher than number of districts – 146
abnormal representation – deputies are elected not in all electoral
districts but their number is higher that number of districts - 45

4. Example - representation of cities and rayons in
Chernigiv oblast council
not represented (no deputies elected) – 2
represented in accordance with a number of
electoral districts – 9
number of deputies is less than number of
districts – 3
number of deputies is higher than number of
districts – 9
abnormal representation – deputies are
elected not in all electoral districts but their
number is higher that number of districts - 3
city of Chernigiv – none of 12 districts has a deputy!

5. Electoral Districts to Chernigiv oblast council
Variations of average number of voters
per district in a territory
(rayon, city of oblast significance)
from the average number of voters per
district in oblast
Within ± 15% - 15 territories
>15% variation upward – 2 territories
> 15% variation downward – 9 territories

6. Rayon councils: the same representation problems
Example: representation of local councils
in Krynychky rayon council
(Dnipropetrovsk oblast)
not represented (no deputies elected) – 3
represented in accordance with a number of electoral
districts – 12
number of deputies is less than number of districts – 3
number of deputies is higher than number of districts – 3

7. “The election law should be reviewed in order to ensure equality of
the vote and bring it in line with OSCE commitments and other
international obligations for democratic elections.”
Final Report of the OSCE/ODIHR EOM
Local Elections
25 October and 15 November 2015
Recommendations of international organizations

8. 21 May 2019 – constituent meeting of the Working Group on development of
amendments to the election legislation to ensure proportional representation of
citizens in community councils and local communities in rayon and oblast
councils
By 1 July 2019 – development of a concept of improvement of local election
legislation to ensure proportional representation
July-August 2019 – Discussion on main principles of the draft legislation (or
amendments to the law/Code?)
September 2019 – development of the draft legislation
Working Group Agenda