Legal wars to come?

More and more political commentators are predicting an untidy post-election period following to the September 30th VR elections.

E.g. at a round table discussion, former President Leonid Kravchuk predicted that voting could be declared void, or 150 elected deputies, dissatisfied with results, could refuse swear an oath of acceptance of office. [Over 150 deputies ripped up their mandates to sink the previous, 5th convocation of the VR - a tactic that could come back to haunt the president]

The new, 6th VR convocation, may not be able to function, but the present one, - the 5th convocation, which has held sessions even though it was 'dismissed', is considered illegitimate by half the country. As a result - the country could remain without a parliament, says Kravchuk.

He added that in this case: "The President has the possibility to introduce direct presidential administration. He can turn to the people and say there is no parliament, it is necessary to formulate a budget and so forth. But if he does this, it will be the beginning of the end of the orange authority. When the President has only about 10% of the country's support, then to go this way is dangerous for Ukraine."

More likely, if no clear winner emerges in the voting, a drawn-out battle in the courts will ensue.

Other commentators are taking note of statements made by Serhiy Kivalov, who has now taken over the role of PoR's legal manager, about how, if the election results are challenged in court, it could be 50 days before any decisions are made. Something I posted on a couple of days ago. [some good photos of S.K. in this link]

Also 'Ukrainska Pravda', in an article entitled "Arsenals of Yushchenko, Tymoshenko, and Yanukovych in the judicial war", describes who will be loyal to whom in the Central Election Commission, in the various courts, judicial councils, Prosecutor General's office etc., in the event of a judicial war taking place.

The article concludes: "Of course any mechanism has flaws, however, at the end of the campaign, it is the Yushchenko-Tymoshenko team, and not Yanukovych's, which has demonstrated a systematic approach to their preparation for post-election [legal] battles."