Democratic Party of Ukraine Демократична партія України | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Leader | Svitlana Kostyuk |
| Founders | Yuriy Badzyo Ivan Drach Dmytro Pavlychko Volodymyr Yavorivsky |
| Founded | December 16, 1990; 34 years ago (1990-12-16) |
| Split from | People's Movement of Ukraine |
| Headquarters | Kyiv, Ukraine |
| Ideology | Social democracy[1] National Democracy |
| Kyiv City Council | 0 / 120 |
TheDemocratic Party of Ukraine (Ukrainian:Демократична партія України;Demokratychna Partiya Ukrayiny) is apolitical party in Ukraine registered in 1991.[2] Until 2006 it had a parliamentary representation, but after associating itself with thePeople's Democratic Party, the Democratic Party disappeared from political arena.
The party did not participate in either the2012 nor the2014 parliamentary elections.[3]
The party's roots can be found inPeople's Movement of Ukraine (Rukh), the Ukrainiannational democratic movement, and 1960s dissident movement (shistdesyatnyky). While the party's inaugural congress would only be held on 16 December 1990, the party's draft manifesto was first published in the newspaperLiteraturna Ukraïna on 31 May 1990, and its creation announced by party leaders inTerebovlia on 22 September 1990. They included figures such asIvan Drach,Dmytro Pavlychko,Volodymyr Yavorivsky, and Vitalii Donchyk.[4]
The party's draft manifesto, based onYuriy Badzyo's 1989 programme for a "Ukrainian Party of Democratic Socialism and State Independence", called for the establishment of an independent Ukraine, affirmed the party as a member of the social democratic movement, and opposed the formation of anew union between the republics of the Soviet Union.[4]
However, the party's long delay before holding its first congress meant many initial supporters abandoned it for other projects or remained independent, while the right-wingUkrainian Republican Party (URP) had already established itself as the premier Ukrainian nationalist party.[4]
The programme eventually adopted by the party at its congress committed it to liberal and humanist values and adopted acivic nationalist conception of a future Ukrainian state. Economically, it called for the gradual reduction of state intervention into the economy and a "guarantee of the social defense of the population". During this time, the rehabilitation of theOrganisation of Ukrainian Nationalists andUkrainian Insurgent Army (OUN-UPA) among national democratic circles became a point of contention, especially for the party's eastern members, even as Pavlychko declared that the party would oppose both the "dictatorship of Bolshevism" and theintegral nationalism ofDmytro Dontsov.[4]
Upon its founding the party had a faction of 23 deputies in theSupreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR led by Dymytro Pavlychko, and claimed another 19 "sympathisers". Yuriy Badzyo was elected the party's leader.[4]
The party initially chose people's deputy and economistVolodymyr Pylypchuk as its candidate in the1991 Ukrainian presidential election but failed to collect enough signatures for his candidacy. Instead, the party opted to support ex-CommunistLeonid Kravchuk despite the presence of other national democratic candidates such as Rukh'sViacheslav Chornovil.[4]
Between 1991 and 1992 the party gradually shifted closer toward the Ukrainian Republican Party and adopted a more radically nationalist line. The party's newspaper began to devote many of its pages to positive portrayals of the OUN-UPA and blaming its poor historical image in eastern Ukraine on Soviet propaganda, and the draft programme for its second congress referred to Ukraine as the ethnic territory of Ukrainians. It was also the first party to call for the Supreme Soviet to declare Ukrainian independence on the day of the1991 Soviet coup attempt.[4]
Badzyo stood down as chairman at the party's second congress in December 1992. Volodomyr Yavorivsky was elected as his replacement.[4]
In the1994 parliamentary election, the party won 2 seats. In the1998 elections, the party was part of the Electoral bloc NEP with theParty of Economic Revival, the combination won 1,22% of the national vote;[5][6] the party gained 1 (single-mandateconstituency) seat.[7] In a union with theDemocratic Union[6] the party gained 4 constituency seats during the2002 Ukrainian parliamentary election.
In the2006 elections, the party took part in the allianceBlock of People's Democratic Parties but this alliance did not overcome the 3% threshold (winning only 0.49% of the votes) and therefore no seats.[6] In the 30 September2007 elections, the party failed as part of theUkrainian Regional Asset to win parliamentary representation.[6]
The merger ofUnited Centre with the Democratic Party of Ukraine failed to materialize prior to the first ever congress of United Centre.[8]
In July 2011 the chairman of the Democratic Party of Ukraine Sergey Kozachenko was sentenced to eight years in prison Kyiv District Court of Simferopol on charges of embezzling ₴65 million in credit union's "Southern".[9]
In November 2011 the party formed a faction in the Kyiv City Council of 7 deputies,[10] this while in the previous2008 Kyiv City Council election the party had not won any seats.[11]
In the2014 Kyiv City Council election, the party won 2 seats.[12] But in the2015 Kyiv local election it lost these seats (it scored less than 2% of the vote).[13]
The party did not participate in the2014 Ukrainian parliamentary election.[14]
| Parliamentary representation | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Votes | % | Mandates | Notes | ||||
| 1994 | 312,842 | 1.20 | 2 | Participated independently | ||||
| 1998 | 326,489 | 1.22 | 1 | as part "Block of Democratic Parties" | ||||
| 2002 | 227,393 | 0.87 | 4 | as part of Democratic Party - Democratic Union | ||||
| 2006 | 126,586 | 0.49 | 0 | as part ofPeople's Democratic Parties | ||||
| 2007 | 80,944 | 0.34 | 0 | as part ofUkrainian Regional Asset | ||||
| 2012 | did not participate | |||||||
| 2014 | ||||||||
| International | |
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| National | |
