The world’s eyes on Ukraine
Archived Articles | 07 Jan 2005 | Adu RaudkiviEWR
A day after western Christmas, Ukraine went to the polls again, after the previous presidential election vote was ruled null and void by the Ukrainian Supreme Court. Viktor Yushchenko, former prime minister, pro western candidate has won. He defeated the current Prime Minister, pro Russian Viktor Yanukovych. But that wasn't the end of it. Yanukovych didn't admit the inevitable. His tactic was to take a sheaf of complaints to the Supreme Court. Finally, on December 31, Yanukovych conceded.
In the initial election the final run-off presidential vote was so rife with fraud that hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians ended up on the main square of Kiev, blocking the presidential palace and protesting the rigged outcome, according to which Yanukovych, the choice of former president Leonid Kuchma had triumphed. Results of the election were opposed by the U.S., European Union, and Canada, - all of whom had noted the fraudulence of the election. The only country that supported the outcome of the election was Russia.
This time around the Government of Canada sent a team of five hundred observers, to monitor polling stations, chosen and trained by the Government, passage paid by the Ukranian Canadian Council. Another five hundred went as translators to the Canadian contingent. The Canadian body was headed up by former Prime Minister John Turner, backed by eight ministers and members of parliament. More than three thousand Canadians volunteered for the five hundred positions.
Thousands of observers from other countries also went to the Ukraine, providing enough people to man all the polls, thus preventing any potential electoral fraud from occurring.
Some people in the west had only seen Yushchenko’s pictures emphasizing a somewhat pock-marked face were shocked when they dicovered that he had been in reality Adonis-like, very good looking. A Vienna medical clinic, which treated Yushchenko for an overdose, testified that he had been poisoned by six thousand times normal dosages of dioxin. The timing of the poisoning was linked to the day when he was asked to have supper with the head of the Ukrainian security service. Some doctors have suggested he might not have more than five years to live.
Ukraine is generally divided with the east and south being pro-Russian and also more industrialized voting for Yanukovych whereas the western part of the country is pro-west, less industrialized, more agricultural, and supportive of Yushchenko. It is possible that the western part suffered more during the Ukrainian Holocaust, where ten million people died as a result of the articial famine created by Joseph Stalin.
Currently seventy percent of Ukrainians speak Russian. Yanukovych wants Russian to become an official language in Ukraine whereas Yushchenko does not. The issue is similar to the one in Estonia, although in Ukraine the sides are more even, and the population is larger.
Toronto Sun columnist Bob MacDonald said, " Vladimir Putin told the west not to interfere with Ukraine, yet constantly was involving himself with it. Putin visited Ukraine twice during the lead-up to the first round of the elections.” MacDonald explained this by noting that “whatever Russians see, they think that they own.”
When Yushchenko accepted Yanukovych's concession the crowd was again massing in the square in front of the presidential palace, but this time out of joy, singing the Ukrainian national anthem - led by their new democratically elected leader.
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