Repeat elections in five disputed districts to be held in March 2013, Regions Party says

Repeat elections in five disputed single-seat election districts will most likely be held in March 2013, the leader of the Regions Party faction in parliament, Oleksandr Yefremov, has said.

"We have three bills on this issue. It's not fundamentally important whether such a bill is adopted by the current or next parliament. It's fundamentally important that the current parliamentary majority agree to such a form of the elections with a greater number of votes," he said at a press conference in Kyiv on Monday.

"Why is it not important [what composition of parliament introduces amendments to the electoral law]? In terms of date, nobody will hold the [repeat] elections, for example, on January 14. You know perfectly well why. The elections will most likely be held in March. Sixty days is the countdown to the elections," Yefremov said.

As reported, in the parliamentary elections on October 28, the Central Election Commission recognized the impossibility of establishing the election results in five single-seat districts – Nos. 94 (Obukhiv, Kyiv region), 132 (Pervomaisk, Mykolaiv region), 194 and 197 (Cherkasy region) and 223 (Kyiv, Shevchenkivsky district).

The Verkhovna Rada proposed that the CEC call repeat elections in these districts. However, the CEC said that this problem should be resolved legislatively, because the law does not envisage such a ground for the holding of repeat elections as the impossibility of establishing the election results.

The opposition said that it would insist on a revote in five disputed districts and would not support in parliament a bill introducing amendments to the electoral law for the holding of repeat elections in these districts.