UKRAINE’S COMMUNISTS AND SOCIALISTS LEFT BEHIND BY PARLIAMENTARY ELECTION DEAL
New elections could shut out Ukraine’s left-wing parties
ANALYSIS & COMMENTARY: By Taras Kuzio
Eurasia Daily Monitor, Volume 4, Issue 93
The Jamestown Foundation, Washington, D.C., Fri, May 11, 2007
Ukraine’s constitutional crisis seemed resolved on May 4, when Prime
Minister Viktor Yanukovych agreed to early parliamentary elections. But the
date of the vote cannot be finalized until a compromise package of
legislative and constitutional changes is adopted (see EDM, May 4, 9).
President Viktor Yushchenko has to choose whether to go ahead with the vote
on July 1 or July 8, before the summer recess. Alternatively, he could hold
them in September or October, as the pro-Yanukovych Anti-Crisis Coalition
(ACC) prefers.
However, the adoption of the necessary legal package is being dragged out by
the two left-wing members of the ACC, the Socialists (SPU) and Communists
(KPU), who are as much to blame for the crisis as they are for holding up
its resolution.
The SPU and KPU fear being shut out of the next parliament and disappearing
as a political force. The Socialists’ votes would likely be picked up by the
center-left Yuriy Lutsenko and Yulia Tymoshenko (BYuT) blocs.
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