In Ukraine, they proposed introducing criminal liability for “political pimping.” Such a proposal, as Kommersant-Ukraine writes, was made by deputies from the opposition party Batkivshchyna.

The oppositionists have already registered the corresponding bill in the Verkhovna Rada (at the time of writing this note, its text had not yet been published on the parliament’s website). According to the publication, the authors of the document propose to punish “involvement in political prostitution” with imprisonment for a term of five to ten years, with confiscation of property.

They propose to consider political prostitution as “a change of political views or deviation from the election program under pressure from the authorities, for money or other preferences,” and political pimping, respectively, is bribery of deputies or pressure on them in order to attract them to a certain side.

Deputy Andriy Senchenko, who is one of the authors of the bill, does not hide that the purpose of the document is to combat the transition of opposition deputies to the side of the government (the appearance of so-called “carcasses” in the Verkhovna Rada).

At the same time, the bill does not provide for criminal liability for defectors themselves—following the logic of the authors of the document, for “political prostitutes.” According to Senchenko, such deputies should bear only political responsibility: to voters in elections.

The ruling Party of Regions considered the opposition's initiative frivolous. They stated that, for that matter, punishment should also be provided for those who previously included “carcasses” in the electoral lists. The opposition “UDAR” party of Vitali Klitschko also reacted skeptically to the bill on “political pimping”.

Such a phenomenon as the transition of deputies from one political camp to another has existed in the Verkhovna Rada for a long time. It has become widespread since 2010. Then Viktor Yanukovych won the presidential election, and the formation of a new ruling coalition led by his Party of Regions began in parliament. However, the coalition created from three political forces: the Party of Regions, the Communist Party and the Lytvyn Bloc did not have enough votes to obtain a majority. Deputies who went over to the side of the new government from the opposition Bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko and Our Ukraine - People's Self-Defense helped get votes.

Later, dozens of oppositionists began to leave the “carcasses” (the so-called deputies who were expelled or left the opposition factions themselves, but did not join the party in power after that, simply supporting it during voting in parliament). Before the 2012 elections, the opposition promised not to allow this to happen in the new parliament. However, immediately after the formation of the new Rada, two deputies left the ranks of the opposition - father and son Tabalov. Later, several more similar cases were recorded.

In early June, a group of deputies from Batkivshchyna, as the publication notes, stated that representatives of the Party of Regions offered them from three to six million dollars to leave the faction. The party in power itself denies any involvement in bribing oppositionists.

In Ukraine they came up with a punishment for political pimping