More than a week has passed since the moment of voting for a bill №2831-3 “On local elections”, which deprives IDPs of the right to vote on forthcoming elections. 257 deputies decided to ignore 1.4 millions of citizens of their country. Core organizations, which work on protection of IDPs’ rights, criticized those provisions. Discussion unfolded in social networks and its temperature rose very fast.

When reading posts and hundreds of comments in social networks you understand, that even adequate people – experts in franchise, volunteers and politicians, officials and journalists – have some false notions about participation of IDPs in elections.

Myth 1: IDPs are not registered in accordance with the law

It is not right. IDPs register in social security departments (Departments of Labour and Social Protection of Population) according to the Regulation of the Cabinet of Ministers №509, otherwise they cannot get certificate of an IDP. Place of actual residency is mentioned in this certificate. When IDP gets such certificate, he/she has to get a stamp of the Migration Service according to the Regulation of the Cabinet of Ministers №79.

That is why it is possible not only to anticipate how many IDPs live in certain areas, but also to forecast a number of such people at a polling station. List of IDPs is carried by the Ministry of Social Policy. IDPs don’t violate the Law on Migration, because the law “On Provision of Rights and Freedoms of Internally Displaced Persons” Article 5 states that registration of the place of residency of an IDP has to be made in passport document.

Myth 2: IDPs demand special attitude

You can come across the next argument in social networks – “I live here for 10 years and go to vote to parents to Zaporozhie. How can I choose authorities for Kiev residents?”

In reality system of formation of voters’ lists in Ukraine is not perfect. It has to be revised, just as the system of registration. And, of course, a person, who lives and works in Kiev for 10 years, also has to have opportunity to choose authorities for Kiev, not for Zaporozhie. It is fair towards Kiev’s community and community of Zaporozhie as well.

A person, who goes to work, uses public transport, pays taxes, goes to hospital, takes children to school or kindergarten, drinks coffee in café and sees advertisings on city-lights has a right to impact the way public institutions work. It is obvious that not everyone has an opportunity to buy housing, and it is almost unreal to rent a flat on condition that the owner would register you. The main difference of IDPs is that their migration was forced, not thought-out. They did it to save their lives and lives of their relatives. IDPs don’t have another city, where they can vote. They’ve already resettled and started to use services of another city: schools, kindergartens, job centers and etc. They became a part of community. Problem of IDPs’ voting at local elections – is a rising need to revise a notion of “territorial community” – from the soviet one – with a stamp in passport – to civilized European system with actual place of residency, where people pay taxes, but not a demand for privileges.

Myth 3: IDPs don’t know local problems

One more argument is that IDPs cannot vote, because they don’t know local specificity. But we have to note, that up-to-date legislation on IDPs is build in such way that a person has to visit Department of Labour and Social Protection to get the status of IDP and also visit Migration Service to get children into school or kindergarten. They communicate with Department of Education, schools’ directors, get registered at hospitals, address job centers, reregister entrepreneurships, address Registration Service and Tax Service … We can list a lot of institutions, where IDPs go to get back to normal life.

I would even say – it’s vice versa: to know how local public services work – you should talk to IDPs. Kiev residents can do the same for 10 years, but IDPS – for a month.

Myth 4: IDPs will be brought by busses to falsify elections

This is even more absurd argument. Don’t try to cure all illnesses with “Tsytromon”, and don’t try to turn the problem of falsification to IDPs. We don’t cancel elections because of a potential possibility to falsify it. But here people are sure that IDPs can be manipulated in some special way.

The first thing, which had to be done – is to get acquainted with proposed amendments and mechanism of IDPs inclusion into voters’ lists. The law offers a request system – an IDP takes his/her passport and certificate of an IDP and addresses election commission (30 days before) with an application to include him/her to the voters’ list for elections according to current address. The person gets confirmation on Election Day and goes to polling station to vote. There will be not so many such people and I promise you — those will be people, who really feel themselves citizens of this country.

If you think that it is the easiest thing to do – to find IDPs, bring them to the CEC a month before, write an application and tell them a month later to vote for somebody – it’s a mistake. Buckwheat from a shovel is much easier, cheaper and faster, but, unfortunately, it doesn’t work.

The same story about “busses from Luhansk” … Access system, approved by the SCU, is so complex, that furtive candidate would rather avoid registration of hundreds permits, search for private cars, because busses are forbidden, in order to bring people a month before elections to apply for participation in elections and one more time later – on Election Day – to bring them all to a polling station. Every vote will cost at least 1500-2000 UAH. It’s a lot, don’t you think?

Myth 5: People without registration cannot influence elections

Elections – are a process, when voter impacts the result. If community of a settlement increased by 20 %, than those 20% of people will influence elections. But the worst thing to do is to pretend those people are not members of the community and exclude them from the election process. Admit that the city changed, when its population increased by 20% — that’s more load for public transport, longer queues to kindergartens, more entrepreneurs and etc. As for local resident it would be useful to know what candidates to local government bodies can offer IDPs, how they are going to solve your common problems, how they are going to improve life in the city.

Of course we can keep on listing myths about IDPs and remember traditions, rules, “people, who came without an invitation and vote”. We can also remember historical examples, when it was a norm to prohibit black skinned people and women to vote, but today it sounds absurd. When Ukraine will step towards people, will help them integrate into the community, help to go through the conflict – it will be the first sign that it is United Country. First of all, elections are a responsibility for future, which we choose. Let’s build it together.

Aleksandra Dvoretskaya, coordinator of legal department of the “Vostok-SOS” for the Informator.lg.ua