Mahera: CEC doing everything for electoral process to comply with standards

The Central Election Commission is doing all it can for the electoral process to flow in accordance with the standards defined by international practice, deputy chairman of the Central Election Commission Andriy Mahera said during the meeting with the election observation delegation from the Office of Mission of the European Parliament, which assesses the electoral environment on the eve of elections to the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.

MEP Pawel Kowal said that soon the delegation plans to begin the active phase of the observation of the electoral process.

In turn, Mahera pointed out that he hopes for an objective assessment of the Ukrainian election by official observers, which they did on the basis of fundamental observations following the results of the process.

Mahera also informed of the major challenges and problems, which accompany the parliamentary election and face the CEC. In particular, he named the differences between the effective law on parliamentary election and those election laws of 2006 and 2007. In addition, he noted that this time the election will be held under proportional-majority, rather than a purely proportional system, as it was before.

He, however, noted that this is not the main problem of the election: "The main problem is the sad Ukrainian tradition to change the electoral law for every new election. That is what puts the members of election commissions at all levels in a rather difficult position. That is why there were many difficulties in the formation of precinct election commissions".

"However, I am convinced that the electoral system with the legislation will not stand still and will be progressively developed, so we will come to such a law, which will take into account all the recommendations of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and the OSCE," Mahera said.

At the end of the meeting, deputy chairman of the Central Election Commission appreciated the cooperation of the European Parliament with the Central Election Commission and thanked EU MP for his constant attention and full support for the organization of election in Ukraine.

In his turn Mr. Koval hoped that the activity of the delegation will contribute to further development of constructive relations between Ukraine and the European Parliament.