KIEV, May 24 – President Viktor Yanukovych said he plans to hold a meeting with opposition groups within days to see if legislation can be approved that would allow scheduling of local elections in the fall.

The elections were due last year, but had been postponed indefinitely because the government of then-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko had failed to provide financing.

“To further delay the election means violating the constitution,” Yanukovych said in an interview with three Ukrainian television channels on Sunday. “This is unacceptable and I will never go for it.”

“I will start consultations with all political groups, including with opposition,” Yanukovych said. “We have to make a deal, to make sure that the legislation is drafted and approved.”

This is the first time that Yanukovych has publically spoken about the need to hold consultations with the opposition groups since his inauguration in February.

This may be signaling a change as Yanukovych has so far effectively ignored concerns from opposition groups, while instead has been recruiting individual opposition members to bolster his governing coalition.

“If the legislation is submitted [to Parliament] in the near future, they can be approved and to hold the elections in the fall,” Yanukovych said.

Meanwhile, the support of the opposition groups may be required for Yanukovych to approve the election legislation as his two coalition partners may seek to derail it.

Parliamentary Speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn, whose party controls about 7,000 lawmakers in local councils throughout Ukraine may lose many of them if the elections are held in the fall, analysts said.

Lytvyn voters may be unhappy with his joining forces with the Regions Party earlier this year to create the governing coalition, and for supporting the controversial agreement extending the stay of the Russian navy in Ukraine by 25 years through 2042.

Lytvyn argued the local election must be scheduled on March 27, 2011, the time that analysts said he will try to use improve his standing.

“He thinks that due to his position as the speaker of Parliament he will strengthen his party and will get more votes in the local elections,” Volodymyr Zubanov, a lawmaker from the Regions Party, told Channel 5. (tl/ez)