Project profile — Transparent and Competitive Elections

• Ukraine (100.00%)

• Government And Civil Society, General: Elections (15151) (100.00%)

• Gender equality (significant objective)
• Environmental sustainability (cross-cutting) (not targeted)
• Participatory development and good governance (principal objective)
• Trade development (not targeted)
• Biodiversity (not targeted)
• Climate change mitigation (not targeted)
• Climate Change Adaptation (not targeted)
• Urban issues (not targeted)
• Desertification (not targeted)
• Children's issues (not targeted)
• Youth Issues (not targeted)
• Indigenous Issues (not targeted)
• Disability (not targeted)
• ICT as a tool for development (not targeted)

The project aims to create a more transparent and systematic election process in Ukraine during the 2012 parliamentary elections while empowering members of civil society to exercise their role as providers of information regarding electoral fraud and misconduct. Project components include providing legal advice and support to the Chesno campaign, a civic movement aiming to improve citizen knowledge about candidates. The project also supports the Central Election Commission in Ukraine in developing training curricula for election commissioners. In addition, the project trains party representatives, electoral candidates, civil society organizations, journalists, lawyers and judges on how to use the electoral dispute resolution system in Ukraine.

The expected intermediate outcomes for this project include: increased public awareness of campaign financing irregularities and misconduct by male and female electoral candidates during the 2012 parliamentary elections in Ukraine; and increased capacity of election stakeholders to file complaints and appeals related to the electoral process.

Results achieved as of the end of the project (July 2013) include: Civil society groups, such as Chesno movement, received legal counselling and knowledge on legal recourse necessary to address electoral violations during the elections. They provided voters with impartial information on individual deputy candidates while staying on the right side of Ukraine’s strict libel laws. In addition, training for administrative court judges and political party and candidate representatives resulted in their increased ability to use election dispute resolution mechanisms. Altogether 655 judges (344 M/311 W) and 443 party/candidate representatives (279 M/164 W) received the tools needed to respond to electoral violations quickly and effectively and formed a common understanding of how the problems should be addressed. Prior to the elections, a set of gender-responsive training materials was developed and disseminated to almost 600,000 precinct election commission members. Approximately 71% of them received in-person training via a cascade model implemented though training of trainers from district election commissions.

• Proactive disclosure