The Police Received 4,375 Complaints about Violations of the Election Process

On 25 October, the day of the local elections in Ukraine, the police received 4,375 statements and reports of violations of the election process. 224 administrative protocols were drawn up and 77 criminal proceedings were instituted, the Ministry of Internal Affairs said.

In particular, one-third of the criminal proceedings concerned illegal campaigning, violation of the secrecy of the ballot – 234, bribery of voters – 191, and illegal destruction of election documents – 159.

According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, police also received 12 reports of polling stations being mined, all of which were untrue. Several more people have been detained on suspicion of bribing voters.

As for 7 p.m. on 25 October, 484 reports of violations were recorded in Kyiv. In Kyiv region those were 465, in Dnipropetrovsk region – 371, Donetsk region – 265, Odesa region – 228, Lviv region – 224, Kharkiv region – 219, Zaporizhzhia region – 205, Poltava region – 197, Cherkasy region – 142, Kherson region – 141, Vinnytsia region – 120, Zakarpattia region – 117, Sumy region – 112, Rivne region – 90, Mykolaiv region – 87, Khmelnytsky region – 86, Chernihiv and Kirovohrad regions – 82 each, Ternopil region – 72, Luhansk region – 66, Ivano-Frankivsk region – 56, Volyn region – 44, Zhytomyr region – 26 and Chernivtsi region – 22.

Ihor Klymenkom, the Head of the National Police, said, “I emphasise that of all the allegations and reports of violations, the largest number is campaigning on election day, violation of the secrecy of the ballot, bribery of voters and illegal destruction of documents.”

In addition, he noted that during election day, the police recorded the organisation of “carousels” (voting of the same people at different polling stations – Ed.) and have already detained the organisers of the schemes.

As for the “carousels” that we reported earlier, the police identified the organiser of the scheme, who arranged for the arrival of 24 residents of Luhansk region in the capital. By train “Popasna–Kyiv,” these people came to the capital, and then they were taken centrally to the village of Gatne in Kyiv region.

“We have found out all the participants of the ‘carousel.’ The organisers were informed about the suspicion,” the policeman said.

It should be noted that local elections took place in Ukraine on 25 October. Ukrainians elected deputies to local councils, settlement, village, and city mayors. The turnout was almost 37%.

Natalia Tolub