Tuesday, November 15, 2005
SENT NOV 2, 2004
Greetings on Day of US Elections, More on Ukraine's Elections:
As of this evening, Tuesday, November 2, there still has been no official statement from the central electoral commission as to the ultimate outcome of the election. The commission is stating that only 92% of the votes are counted, and that at this point,
Janukovych is still in the lead with 40%, while Jushchenko follows at 39%.
It is interesting to note that the that the the gap between Jushchenko and Janukovych has closed; yesterday the commission was consistenly stating a 4-7 point lead for Janukovych, but have today reduced that lead to (actually, little less than) 1 percent. It has been widely accepted that there will be a second, run-off election on November 21, but the general atmosphere is tense and pensive: all are holding their breath, waiting to hear the final word of the central electoral commission in the context of widespread allegations of electoral violations.
Western observers, who have already stated that the election campaign season was anything but free and fair with the administration of President Leonid Kuchma intervening in support of Janukovych's candidacy were also anouncing last night and today that the election proceeded in an unfair manner with a great deal of violations (for more, I will summarize below the types of "violations" being rumored to have taken place). As to whether these violations were committed in a concerted effort to increase the chances of either Janukovych or Juchchenko was not stated, but there is little doubt that the majority of the violations were in favor of Janukovych. This contrasts with the statement by CIS observers, who claimed that the election was fair and free.
However, in a surprising bit of news, the state of Kyiv (Ukraine's states are named for their capital cities, and Kyiv is both the national as well as a state capital) voted 67% for Jushchenko, 13% for Janukovych. As the saying goes in Ukraine, whoever Kyiv wants, Ukraine wants, and noone expected Jushchenko to gain such a majority in the Kyiv region. The general consensus today seems to be that Jushchenko actually recieved the most votes nationwide, even though no one recieved the 50% necessary to be declared winner of the presidency (parallel counts to the official electoral commission counts show Jushchenko with the majority).
In this context, the day began with news that Viktor Jushchenko, the opposition candidate for Ukraine's presidency, intended to read a resolution on the floor of Ukraine's parlaiment calling for the resignation of Viktor Janukovych, the status quo candidate for the presidency, from his current post as Ukraine's prime minister and for the dismissal of his government. Both Jushchenko and Janukovych are deputies to Ukraine's parlaiment; Jushchenko was himself once prime minister, a position from which he we was dismissed by the current president, Leonid Kuchma.
Ukraine's political structure is a combination of an American-styled presidential republic and of a west European parlaimentary republic. Although there is a prime minister who is appointed by the president and then approved by parliamentary that runs domestic affairs, ultimate authority remains in the office of the president, who can dismiss the prime minister and call for the formation of a new government; and if he so chooses, he can also dismiss the parlaiment itself, call for new elections, or if he deems necessary, rule by decree without a parlaiment, which is a power that he has even when parlaiment is in session. This contrasts both with the west European system in which the president is mosty a ceremonial figure, with real power resting in the office of the prime minister and therefore in parlaimentary coalition building, and with the US system, in which the president can not dismiss the parlaiment (the US congress) and can not rule by decree.
Juschenko was to make his request for Janukovych's resignation on the basis that Janukovych made unfair use of what is called "administrative resources" in support of his election campaign. "Administrative resources" is a term in Ukraine that refers to various institutions in control of the office of the president and his administration, such as state-run media, various control mechanisms over ministeries, and simply put, money. The presidential administration of Leonid Kuchma has dumped huge amounts of these "resources" into supporting Janukovych's candidacy, in violation of the strict objectivity that the president should have been maintaining in the competition. The abuse of these "administrative resources" by the Kuchma administration in support of Janukovych is what led to the widespread condemnation of the campaign season as unfair by both Ukrainian as well as numerous Western observers (in addition to various other violations of the precedents of free and fair election campaigns, including intimidation tactics used by supporters of Janukovych).
In the end, Jushchenko declined to read the resolution on the floor of the parlaiment; nonethelss debate about Janukovych's status did emerge briefly over a seperate issue, in the course of a discussion of the parallel count of the votes and of the Kyiv region's having had voted for Jushchenko. A national deputy (who's name I missed, but who is a supporter of Jushchenko) stated that according to the "parallel" count, Jushchenko received 11, 387,000 votes while Janukovych has received 11,350,000, sparking a moment of debate during which Julija Tymoshenko--another opposition figure who has backed Jushchenko's candidacy--stated, "I advise that Janukovych hang himself." In the end, nothing was decided.
In other news--about demonstrations. Things have been overall quiet, at least accoring to the official news sources in Ukraine. Apparently in Kyiv yesterday there was a rather small gathering that peaked at about 500 demonstrators on the central square, called Independence Sqaure, while last night only about 50 or so remained. Demonstrators were brandishing PORA! posters (the organization of activists agitating for free and fair elections), etc. That Kyiv was quiet without any noticeable demonstrating was backed by two friends there. However, the news reported that several thousand gathered in L'viv, and I have heard rumors of more, but have been unable to get a hold of any friends in Lviv today before writing this. There was also little in the news today about the student demo in the town of Chernivtsi. I have no idea if this is the result of media blackout about depth of demonstrating going on in the country, and hope to get to the bottom of this in the next day or two. It seems that the general atmosphere is that at this point there is little need of demonstrating, with most people feeling confident that in the end, there will be a second, run-off election. Not to say that people's guard is down--the fact that any demonstrating has occured at all after Jushchenko and PORA! called off mass demonstrations, to my mind indicates a willingnes to demonstrate and fight if need be. And the need still may come, as the official electoral commission still has to make its conclusive statement.
The consensus is that the commission is dragging its feet in announcing the inevitable, the necessity of a run-off. My sense is that the central electoral commission is buying time in order to gauge the atmosphere of the country, trying to see whether they can get away with stealing the election in favor of Janukovych, and possibly even hoping that by dragging things out, people's willingness to demonstrate will dissipate. Perhaps they have been instructed by the debacle of the last presidential election in the US, which showed a sigificant portion of the American public getting impatient to have a president, any president, declared. Thus I fear that it was a mistake to call off the demonstrations. But that is just my, albeit informed, opinion.
That's it for now. Tomorrow I will try to write about some of the newer rumors of voting violations that took place.
Stefan
As of this evening, Tuesday, November 2, there still has been no official statement from the central electoral commission as to the ultimate outcome of the election. The commission is stating that only 92% of the votes are counted, and that at this point,
Janukovych is still in the lead with 40%, while Jushchenko follows at 39%.
It is interesting to note that the that the the gap between Jushchenko and Janukovych has closed; yesterday the commission was consistenly stating a 4-7 point lead for Janukovych, but have today reduced that lead to (actually, little less than) 1 percent. It has been widely accepted that there will be a second, run-off election on November 21, but the general atmosphere is tense and pensive: all are holding their breath, waiting to hear the final word of the central electoral commission in the context of widespread allegations of electoral violations.
Western observers, who have already stated that the election campaign season was anything but free and fair with the administration of President Leonid Kuchma intervening in support of Janukovych's candidacy were also anouncing last night and today that the election proceeded in an unfair manner with a great deal of violations (for more, I will summarize below the types of "violations" being rumored to have taken place). As to whether these violations were committed in a concerted effort to increase the chances of either Janukovych or Juchchenko was not stated, but there is little doubt that the majority of the violations were in favor of Janukovych. This contrasts with the statement by CIS observers, who claimed that the election was fair and free.
However, in a surprising bit of news, the state of Kyiv (Ukraine's states are named for their capital cities, and Kyiv is both the national as well as a state capital) voted 67% for Jushchenko, 13% for Janukovych. As the saying goes in Ukraine, whoever Kyiv wants, Ukraine wants, and noone expected Jushchenko to gain such a majority in the Kyiv region. The general consensus today seems to be that Jushchenko actually recieved the most votes nationwide, even though no one recieved the 50% necessary to be declared winner of the presidency (parallel counts to the official electoral commission counts show Jushchenko with the majority).
In this context, the day began with news that Viktor Jushchenko, the opposition candidate for Ukraine's presidency, intended to read a resolution on the floor of Ukraine's parlaiment calling for the resignation of Viktor Janukovych, the status quo candidate for the presidency, from his current post as Ukraine's prime minister and for the dismissal of his government. Both Jushchenko and Janukovych are deputies to Ukraine's parlaiment; Jushchenko was himself once prime minister, a position from which he we was dismissed by the current president, Leonid Kuchma.
Ukraine's political structure is a combination of an American-styled presidential republic and of a west European parlaimentary republic. Although there is a prime minister who is appointed by the president and then approved by parliamentary that runs domestic affairs, ultimate authority remains in the office of the president, who can dismiss the prime minister and call for the formation of a new government; and if he so chooses, he can also dismiss the parlaiment itself, call for new elections, or if he deems necessary, rule by decree without a parlaiment, which is a power that he has even when parlaiment is in session. This contrasts both with the west European system in which the president is mosty a ceremonial figure, with real power resting in the office of the prime minister and therefore in parlaimentary coalition building, and with the US system, in which the president can not dismiss the parlaiment (the US congress) and can not rule by decree.
Juschenko was to make his request for Janukovych's resignation on the basis that Janukovych made unfair use of what is called "administrative resources" in support of his election campaign. "Administrative resources" is a term in Ukraine that refers to various institutions in control of the office of the president and his administration, such as state-run media, various control mechanisms over ministeries, and simply put, money. The presidential administration of Leonid Kuchma has dumped huge amounts of these "resources" into supporting Janukovych's candidacy, in violation of the strict objectivity that the president should have been maintaining in the competition. The abuse of these "administrative resources" by the Kuchma administration in support of Janukovych is what led to the widespread condemnation of the campaign season as unfair by both Ukrainian as well as numerous Western observers (in addition to various other violations of the precedents of free and fair election campaigns, including intimidation tactics used by supporters of Janukovych).
In the end, Jushchenko declined to read the resolution on the floor of the parlaiment; nonethelss debate about Janukovych's status did emerge briefly over a seperate issue, in the course of a discussion of the parallel count of the votes and of the Kyiv region's having had voted for Jushchenko. A national deputy (who's name I missed, but who is a supporter of Jushchenko) stated that according to the "parallel" count, Jushchenko received 11, 387,000 votes while Janukovych has received 11,350,000, sparking a moment of debate during which Julija Tymoshenko--another opposition figure who has backed Jushchenko's candidacy--stated, "I advise that Janukovych hang himself." In the end, nothing was decided.
In other news--about demonstrations. Things have been overall quiet, at least accoring to the official news sources in Ukraine. Apparently in Kyiv yesterday there was a rather small gathering that peaked at about 500 demonstrators on the central square, called Independence Sqaure, while last night only about 50 or so remained. Demonstrators were brandishing PORA! posters (the organization of activists agitating for free and fair elections), etc. That Kyiv was quiet without any noticeable demonstrating was backed by two friends there. However, the news reported that several thousand gathered in L'viv, and I have heard rumors of more, but have been unable to get a hold of any friends in Lviv today before writing this. There was also little in the news today about the student demo in the town of Chernivtsi. I have no idea if this is the result of media blackout about depth of demonstrating going on in the country, and hope to get to the bottom of this in the next day or two. It seems that the general atmosphere is that at this point there is little need of demonstrating, with most people feeling confident that in the end, there will be a second, run-off election. Not to say that people's guard is down--the fact that any demonstrating has occured at all after Jushchenko and PORA! called off mass demonstrations, to my mind indicates a willingnes to demonstrate and fight if need be. And the need still may come, as the official electoral commission still has to make its conclusive statement.
The consensus is that the commission is dragging its feet in announcing the inevitable, the necessity of a run-off. My sense is that the central electoral commission is buying time in order to gauge the atmosphere of the country, trying to see whether they can get away with stealing the election in favor of Janukovych, and possibly even hoping that by dragging things out, people's willingness to demonstrate will dissipate. Perhaps they have been instructed by the debacle of the last presidential election in the US, which showed a sigificant portion of the American public getting impatient to have a president, any president, declared. Thus I fear that it was a mistake to call off the demonstrations. But that is just my, albeit informed, opinion.
That's it for now. Tomorrow I will try to write about some of the newer rumors of voting violations that took place.
Stefan
