How “canned goods” steal votes in elections

To understand how our opinion is manipulated and votes are stolen in elections, let’s look at the dirty technology of “canned candidate”/“canned party”

Ukraine has entered a period of elections – presidential and then parliamentary. Let's figure out how our opinions are manipulated and our votes are stolen. Today we’ll talk about such a technology as “canned candidate”.

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In the 2002 elections, many Ukrainians were very surprised when the “Winter Generation Team” bloc did not enter the Verkhovna Rada. In fact, looking at the many big boards, commercials on prime time TV channels, and expensive printing, it was hard to believe that in the end “KOPs” received only 2,02% or 525 thousand 25 votes. “Winter Generation Team” is the first example where a technology for stealing votes called “canned food” has successfully worked on the territory of Ukraine. Therefore, the first sign of canned food is a huge pre-election budget, because in a short time it is necessary to pump up the ratings for “new faces in politics”.

But in practice, the votes of the “Winter Generation Team” were simply stolen. “Canned food” in the form of the “Winter Generation Team” became one of the technologies that helped to seriously improve the position of the pro-presidential bloc “For a United Ukraine!”, which did not enjoy much support from voters. As a result, ZaEdU still took third place after the Our Ukraine bloc and the Communist Party of Ukraine with a result of 11,77% (3 million and just over 50 thousand votes).

And Inna Bogoslovskaya and Valery Khoroshkovsky, who played oppositionists and criticized the authorities, received good positions after the elections. Immediately after the elections, Khoroshkovsky received the position of head of the internal policy department in the AP, and in November 2002 he became Minister of Economy in the government of Viktor Yanukovych. And Bogoslovskaya was appointed by President Kuchma in May 2003 to head the State Committee of Ukraine on Regulatory Policy and Entrepreneurship.

Another example of the successful use of “canned food” technology is “Ukraine - Forward!” Natalia Korolevskaya in the 2012 Verkhovna Rada elections.

The little-known people's deputy was proclaimed the “new face” of Ukrainian politics - and the young politician was launched on all broadcasts and talk shows. The second sign of the “canned” technology is the promotion of an opposition politician (you cannot promote a pro-government politician, because he will take away votes from the authorities themselves).

Korolevskaya’s commercials were shown on all TV channels several times an hour, big boards “Ukraine – Forward!” stood at every step, agitators delivered tons of booklets and leaflets to mailboxes.

But according to the results of the vote on October 28.10.2012, 1,58 “Ukraine – Forward!” received a dismal result - only 322% (198 thousand 2 votes), not reaching more than 1% of the barrier in the Verkhovna Rada. By comparison, this was only 1% more than the Pensioners' Party received, which spent a maximum of 100/XNUMX of the Royal's election budget.

And again history repeated itself - a multimillion-dollar budget, intrusive advertising, ambitious plans, and as a result - an unexpected failure. Conversely, the Party of Regions took first place, gaining 30,0% - much more than social studies predicted for it.

And again, the head of the party that failed in the elections received a high position - already in December 2012, President Yanukovych appointed Royal Minister of Social Policy in the government of Mykola Azarov. At first glance, there is no logic. But if you look from the point of view that the “regionals” thanked Korolevskaya for the votes for the PR, then everything becomes clear.

Therefore, the third sign of “canned food” is a high position or financial compensation for the first person, because a person needs to be thanked for securing a few percent of the votes for the authorities.

Another example of “canned food” at the local level is the “Rukh for Reforms” party, with the help of which the authorities rigged the elections to Kiev City Council in October 2015 and elected Vitali Klitschko as mayor of Kyiv. In the elections to Kievrada, the role of “canned food” was played by Sergei Dumchev’s Movement for Reforms. And again, all the signs of technology - a new leader appeared like a jack-in-the-box, although he had never been involved in politics before, again millions of budgets for tents, big boards, leaflets, videos and... again a resounding failure. Having spent about 20 million dollars, the Movement for Reforms received a ridiculous 27 thousand 134 votes (3,1421%), although on the eve of the vote sociologists estimated its result at 8-10%.

But the “party in power” and Klitschko, who are simply hated in Kyiv, became the winners of the elections. “BPP-Solidarity” received 52 mandates, which, together with the “Yednist” party (15 seats), allowed them to form a stable majority in Kyiv City Council. The authorities thanked the new “Rukhovites” for their help: Dumchev was compensated for the costs of the campaign, the Cabinet of Ministers appointed him close to the Ilyichevsk seaport, and the NBU recognized the Premium bank, owned by Dumchev and the Pogiba brothers, as bankrupt and allowed the bank to be liquidated... to employees of the Premium bank.

Finally, it's time to figure out how this technology works. In practice, the “canning” technology works like this. The government allocates a powerful budget for the election campaign, increases the ratings of the opposition candidate/party, and on election night, bribed members of the commissions shift the ballots from the stack for candidate/party X to the stack for the candidate from the government or the pro-government party.

This is how Ukrainian voters, when voting for the opposition, are actually casting their votes for the candidate/“party in power.”

The “canned” technology has proven its effectiveness, so it is highly likely that Bankova will use it in future presidential elections and elections to the Verkhovna Rada.

This means that pre-election “canned goods” will appear in the near future. Inna Bogoslovskaya has already appeared on TV, but she has no prospects of gaining a serious percentage, so in these elections she will again be assigned the role of a torpedo candidate against Yulia Tymoshenko. Another candidate for the “canned” is Anatoly Gritsenko, but the purchase/sale of the “unsuitable” must be negotiated with his sponsors.

A more profitable option for the “canned” technology for the authorities is to promote a candidate who is completely under their control. For example, such as Evgeniy Muraev, who recently announced his retirement from “free swimming.” One of the signs of “canned food” is evident - when six months before the presidential election, a second- or third-tier politician, who has neither his own party nor a team of associates, suddenly announces the start of his own political project, but cannot explain where the funding will come from. If later in the course of the play a multimillion-dollar budget and access to pro-government television channels appear, then we are talking about classic technology for stealing votes. Moreover, Muraev himself may not even understand until the very day of voting that he was assigned the role of “canned food” at Bankova. And that in fact the task of the “canned food” is, on the one hand, to take away votes from the opposition, and on the other, to provide the authorities with 1-2% of the votes.

And after voting day, voters, journalists and political scientists will wonder why millions of dollars in investments brought only 0,5% of the votes.

And the AP’s interest is understandable - today the government’s rating is catastrophically low, so every percentage will count.

Unfortunately, today Ukraine is an illegal state where elections have turned into a competition of dirty tricks and dirty money. Therefore, “canned food” is far from the latest technology for falsifying election results. But forewarned means forearmed. And if we know how dirty technologies work, then we are more likely to be able to fight against them. In future episodes we will talk about other dirty technologies.