The idea of holding mayoral elections in two rounds completely discredited itself. This opinion was voiced by Serhiy Lovochkin, a member of the OPPOSITION BLOC parliamentary faction during a press briefing on Sunday, November 15.
“The idea of holding mayoral elections in two rounds completely discredited itself. This is confirmed by the turnout,” Lovochkin said.
“The authors of this idea assumed that mayors, who are not elected by the majority of votes, lack legitimacy. Therefore, a second round is needed. But, judging by the turnout, people do not want to vote again, because they believe that results of the first round reflect their will, and the winners of the first round should already become mayors. That is why we see very low turnout in the second round,” the politician said.
He said that the second round is needed in order to hand mayoral seats to pro-government candidates.
“Therefore, we did not support this idea from the very beginning. We also believe that in a difficult time when the economy is not at its best, there is no reason to spend budget funds on such an expensive venture as the second round of elections,” Serhiy Lovochkin concluded.
Follow @serhiylovochkin