Running on an anti-establishment program and slamming the previous government as a “group of corrupt elitists”, Acting Prime Minister Denys Tezdzhanenko has been re-elected to his third term and will assume office on May 7. His running mate, Russian socialite and opera singer Maria Ostroukhova will become Deputy Prime Minister same day.
Held from April 18 to April 28, the election saw the participation of three candidates other than Acting Prime Minister: Hannes Bald, an Austrian Freemason and ex-Ambassador of Lostisland to Vienna; Elisha Mendelson, an Israeli videopresenter running with Reb Mordechai Linchart, a Rabbi and Freemason as a candidate for Deputy Prime Minister; and Dr. Arvind Kumar Sharma, an Indian diplomat.
Although the incumbent Acting Prime Minister was given, according to some early polls, as much as 81.8% of the vote, the unusually active (for Lostisland) campaign of his opponent Elisha Mendelson managed, as it turned out, shift many votes in his favor. As a result, for the first time in Lostislandic history no candidate for an executive office managed to secure absolute majority of the vote, leading to a second round between Denys Tezdzhanenko and Elisha Mendelson, with 40% and 29.1% of the vote respectively. Their opponents Hannes Bald and Dr. Arvind Kumar Sharma received 6.4% and 14.5% of the vote respectively and left the electoral race.
Conducted from April 26 to April 29, the second round saw the victory of Denys Tezdzhahenko with 54.8% to 45.2%, yet with a relatively low participation rate which led to the margin between candidates being merely four votes in absolute numbers.
In his post-election speech, Denys Tezdzhanenko proclaimed having “taken Lostisland back” from “corrupt and decadent leadership”, and requested all citizens wishing to obtain a position in Government or in the Diplomatic Corps to notify him of their wishes. The Prime Minister Elect has also reaffirmed his commitment to secularism and pledged that Lostisland will stay a “multi-ethnic and multi-religious place for all involved”.
President Yaroslav Mar is expected to deliver his speech after the inauguration of the Prime Minister.