Elections: Poroshenko Might Win in First Round. ‘Cleaning’ East, New Parliament Elections and Real Decentralization are the First Steps Ukrainians Demand

UKRAINE - In Brief 24 May 2014 by Dmytro Boyarchuk

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The main intrigue of president elections 2014 – whether Petro Poroshenko wins in first round or he needs second round to get his prize. Surveys (mid-May) in one voice give him the victory in this way or another and it is very unlikely that the final result will be too much different. It is not the point of some merits or leadership skills of Petro Poroshenko – Ukrainians are just tired of Yuliya Tymoshenko rhetoric while other candidates look too ‘peculiar’ to be supported by majority. What more, in light of all the turmoil at the East it is a general belief that the country needs new legitimate president ASAP. In this respect, Poroshenko even started leveraging issue of finalizing elections in one round to save time, money and lives of soldiers at the East – and to tell the truth many Ukrainians agree on this argument. Though the outcome of the elections is almost predetermined (unless Russia has prepared some ‘surprises’ for us), voting at the East is really a painful issue. The closer we are to the voting date the more aggressive terrorists become. Separatists do not have enough forces to put the total territory of Donetsk and Lugansk oblasts under control but they can deter many Ukrainians from voting by terrorizing common people. And in fact that is what they have been doing over the last few days – threats of exploding polling points, kidnapping members of local Election Committees, robbing and killing people at the streets, more attacks on Ukrainian forces. Put it different, we are afraid that the next few days might be extremely bloody in Donets and Lugansk oblasts. Still, as many experts have stated, according to current election legislation even if the total ...