KYIV — If Russia hadn’t invaded, Ukraine was meant to hold parliamentary elections next month and a presidential vote in March 2024.

Whether elections could or should happen is once again a lively topic of discussion in Kyiv, after U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham in late August called for Kyiv to organize “free and fair” elections even when it is under all-out assault from Russian attacks.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is strongly suggesting he wants to run for a second term. “In 2024, if the war continues and if elections are held, I will never in my life abandon my country. Because I am the guarantor of the Constitution, and I will defend it in any case,” he said in a recent interview with the Portuguese public broadcaster RTP.

Zelenskyy responded to Graham by saying he is ready — if parliament agrees — to overturn the martial law that bans the country from holding elections in time of war, but it’s a topic that raises major questions about democratic legitimacy: most TV channels are heavily controlled by the government, soldiers would have to vote in frontline trenches and millions of Ukrainians have fled abroad.

Well aware of all of these hurdles, Zelenskyy argues that the West would have to help Ukraine organize voting for some 6.2 million Ukrainian refugees, who left the country after Russia’s invasion in February 2022. He also said Ukraine’s partners would need to provide an additional 5 billion hryvnia (€120 million) to set up polling stations and send observers, particularly in the most complex areas like battle zones.

Despite Zelenskyy’s interest in an election, no one doubts it would be a massive ask.  

Election watchdogs, political analysts, and even opposition MPs, who spoke with POLITICO, agree Ukraine cannot guarantee a free, fair, and safe electoral process while Russia strikes Ukraine with missiles, TV channels are censored, and 20 percent of territory would not be able to vote as it is occupied by the Kremlin’s forces.

“I realize the security environment to conduct an election would be challenging. However, I cannot think of a better investment for the stability of Europe than helping Ukraine survive as an independent, self-governing, Rule of Law-based democracy. I would encourage all of Ukraine’s allies to help provide the financial and technical assistance to support this effort,” Graham said in a tweet.

Battle zone ballots

Olga Aivazovska, head of the board of the Civic Network Opora, a Ukrainian elections watchdog, warned of the dangers of a premature election.

“Elections are about freedom of speech, free movement, no censorship, communication with voters, the activities of political parties, etc. This all cannot be guaranteed in the hot phase of the war,” she told POLITICO.

The looming danger she identified was that without a fair political contest, which would be impossible under the restrictions imposed by the government in time of war, there could be a delegitimization of power.  

“Such an election would be far from an act of democracy during the war. The country might get rulers chosen by only citizens of the part of Ukraine not occupied by Russia. And that will help the Kremlin to fix the new geopolitical reality of control over the other part of Ukraine,” Aivazovska added.  

Staying united

Zelenskyy says he understands the logic of Ukraine’s partners urging Kyiv to hold votes during the war.  

“If you protect democracy, then even during war you should think about this protection. Elections are one of the ways to do it. But it is not for nothing that elections are prohibited by the law during the war. It is very difficult to hold them,” Zelenskyy said.

Zelenskyy added that no one had yet shown him how to organize elections for military personnel on the front lines and for refugees abroad.

While helping to organize voting abroad is possible, Dmytro Razumkov, a Ukrainian MP who used to be Zelenskyy’s political campaign manager in 2019 but is now in opposition, quipped he would like to see how foreign observers would set up their missions on the frontlines under constant bombardment.   

“Neither MPs nor the central election commission can say how much time it will take to create the new voter register. Where are our voters, and how to organize this process? In our country, a huge amount of territory is either under occupation, or the infrastructure there is destroyed, there are no people, no possibility to organize the election process on the ground,” Razumkov told POLITICO.

If that weren’t bad enough, any election campaign means criticism of the current government, and that leads to division when the nation has to stay as united as possible, Razumkov added. “Elections also mean agitation, and access to the media for all candidates. And I haven’t got an interview on Ukraine’s state-controlled national telethon [TV programming] for ages,” Razumkov added.

Can’t delay forever

Experts agree it would be extremely hard to hold elections during the war, but not impossible.  

“A country [at] war, doesn’t fit very well with holding elections. But at the same time, it’s good that they have that debate. It shows also what kind of country they are. They value democracy itself. So I leave it of course up to them. And we’ll see what the outcome is,” Dutch Defense Minister Kajsa Ollongren told POLITICO.

Sooner or later, elections will have to be held, Volodymyr Fesenko, a Ukrainian political analyst, told POLITICO.

“If the war drags on for a few more years, there will inevitably be a debate about elections. It will depend on the scale of fighting,” the analyst added. Still, parliament must cancel the ban on elections during the war, vote on changes to the budget to find the money for election, and change the electoral code.

“We need procedures that will allow people who have changed their place of residence to vote because millions have left their homes. They should be given the opportunity to vote,” Fesenko said. “I predict we might have elections in 2024. But the reality will depend on the scale of hostilities. A new escalation will mean no voting,” he added.

It may be unfair to expect Ukraine to fulfill this commitment in the short-run, Sam van der Staak, Europe director at the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance think-tank, told POLITICO.  

“For Ukraine and the challenges it faces, such inclusion in decision-making is more important now than ever,” he said. “If we lower the bar for Ukraine, it would run counter to the country’s own desires to be treated as a full democracy, and perhaps even feed malign narratives.”