Ukraine Chooses New Rada
// in villages and towns
Ukraine is to sum up on Monday the early parliamentary election that took place on Sunday. Kommersant’s special correspondent Mikhail Zygar spent the entire Sunday on watching the Ukrainian people vote, including such notable persons as President Viktor Yushchenko and Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, and discovered much symbolism in the events.
How Viktor Andreevich and Viktor Fedorovich Voted
Taisia Ivanovna and Polina Lazarevna are two elderly women. They are neighbors, living somewhere on Kastelnaya street. Around 9 a.m. on Sunday, they went to the voting station. Taisia Ivanovna hardly walks, and Polina Lazarevna has poor eyesight. So, it took them long to reach the voting station, although it is not far from their home. It is on the Independence Square (Maidan Nezalezhnosti).
When Taisia Ivanovna and Polina Lazarevna entered the voting station, they were suddenly dazzled by camera lights. Taisia Ivanovna was looking just under her feet, and was afraid to shift her gaze to photographers. Polina Lazarevna, on the contrary, was all eyes, but could not see anything, even through her thick-lens glasses.
Naturally, photographers were interested not in them, but in Viktor Andreevich Yushchenko together with his wife Katerina and daughter Vitalina, who also came to vote at that hour. Yet, there were two old women slowly trudging along right in front of them in the voting station’s narrow hall, making the president and his escort lower their pace and walk so as not to disturb Taisia Ivanovna and Polina Lazarevna.
After trampling in the hall for a while, Viktor Andreevich entered the voting room, received a ballot, and was about to enter a voting booth. Yet, Taisia Ivanovna and Polina Lazarevna miraculously managed to do it earlier, and were already standing by the booths. The president, his wife, and daughter queued up. While the two old women were puttering in the booths, two more elderly citizens came. Viktor Andreevich stepped aside, to let them pass before him as well.
At last, Taisia Ivanovna and Polina Lazarevna began exiting the booths. Viktor Andreevich gallantly offered his hand to Taisia Ivanovna and helped her out of the booth. Then, the president and his wife quickly entered the same booths, filled in the ballots, and came out.
“Move aside, move aside,” yelled photographers at Taisia Ivanovna and Polina Lazarevna, who were trudging towards the exit, obscuring the president. However, the old women did not hear them.
“Move the old women away!” photographers cried out. And then the election commission’s chairman rushed to intercept Taisia Ivanovna and Polina Lazarevna, and took them aside.
Viktor Andreevich looked about and began dropping the ballot in a dignified manner. When he finished, he noticed a group of PACE observers headed by Michael Hancock of Britain. They had been standing there, near the booths, for 30 minutes already, in hopes to talk to the president. Meanwhile, Taisia Ivanovna and Polina Lazarevna began quietly making their way towards the exit.
“Darling, what’s going on here?” Taisia Ivanovna asked me. “Why is everyone running around?”
“Look there, please. There’s the president, Viktor Andreevich Yushchenko,” I said.
She looked attentively at me, at the president, and then said:
“And I’m Taisia Ivanovna. And she is Polina Lazarevna.”
That was how I learned the names of the main characters of the Sunday morning.
The women went slowly towards the exit, while the president talked to journalists for a long time. He said it was a day of challenge for Viktor Fedorovich Yanukovych. Answering the question about who wins, the president answered cagily: he, for whom the Ukrainian nation votes.
Approximately at the same time, a woman was dressing her little son Anton. She put on him blue velvet pants, a blue jacket, and a blue cap with a yellow stripe. Anton is just three years old, so he cannot vote yet. However, his mother took him to Moskovskaya street anyway, to the voting station where Viktor Yanukovych was to vote.
She took her son into the booth, filled in the ballot, and gave it to the boy. The paper was quite large, with 18 parties listed. Certainly, 3-year-old Anton could not reach the urn. So, his mother had to take him up in her arms. Photographers began shooting them, the mother was smiling, but the boy still could not drop the paper into the urn. The ballot missed the urn’s slot every time. Yet, the mother did not get upset.
“His name is Anton,” she introduced her son to journalists.
Here, Viktor Fedorovich Yanukovych appeared with his wife Lyudmila. Anton’s mother with Anton in her arms was quickly taken away, so that no one disturbs the prime minister while he votes.
Lyudmila Yanukovych filled in the ballot earlier than her husband, left the booth with her back turned to journalists, crossed herself, and proudly dropped the ballot into the urn. Having finished, she stood waiting for her husband who was still in the booth.
“Move aside, madam!” a photographer shouted to her.
Lyudmila Yanukovych turned around, gave an apologizing smile, and stepped aside.
And only then had the prime minister appeared from behind the curtain.
Journalists asked him whether it was true that it was a day of challenge for him. The PM replied that it was a day of challenge for entire Ukraine. I asked whether Viktor Fedorovich is going to run for presidency in 2009. He answered cagily that the party will decide, but then added that, personally, he still wants to become president. Answering the question about who will form the coalition, Viktor Fedorovich said: those, for whom the Ukrainian nation votes.
At the exit, a group of young men met the PM, chanting “Yanukovych! Yanukovych!” There was neither Anton, nor his mother around. However, there already has arrived the PACE delegation headed by Michael Hancock.
Viktor Fedorovich took a bunch of white roses from a female supporter, handed it over to his wife, and set out for his headquarters on foot, because it was on the same street. Just in case, security service blocked the street from cars, and whisked occasional passers-by to the street’s opposite side.
Unlike her main rivals, Yulia Tymoshenko left Kiev, and voted in her home city of Dnepropetrovsk. However, there was nearly the same: frightened children, slow old women, zealous security guards, and chanting supporters. Eventually, Yulia Tymoshenko promised meaningfully that those will win for whom the Ukrainian nation votes.
Three Scenarios
The election’s results will be announced on Monday. However, I wanted to know in advance what happens next. So, I took the advice of experienced politicians, and left Kiev, to find out for whom the Ukrainian nation votes.
Gnidyn village was the first stop on my route. The voting station there was right across from the church. Four old women were sitting on the threshold and discussing politics. A dashing song was playing in the second floor. It could be heard through open windows. It was "Another brick in the wall" by Pink Floyd.
First floor hosted a grocery store, a post office, and a police department. The voting went on in a marriage-registry hall on the second floor. Two massive wedding rings were engraved on the wall right near the booths. Apparently, it symbolized the unity of the coalition to be created after the election.
“You are a journalist, aren’t you? Come to my place, everyone here in the village knows me. I’m Leonid Grigorievich, and I live on Central street. We can talk about the election. Ask anyone – everybody knows Colonel Grigorievich. Although we live in a village, we are good at politics. We listen to and read news. I’m a former military man. So, I think that a good strong-willed commander should be in power. Also, if a person can speak without reading a written speech, it means that person knows what he/she speaks of, it means he/she is intelligent.”
“So, who do you mean?”
“You ask? Almost everyone in our village is for her. Because she is strong-willed. We might be wrong. You might criticize me. So what? Politicians can make mistakes, and why can’t we?”
It was obvious in that village that Yulia Tymoshenko has good chances to hammer together a coalition and to head the government.
Then, I arrived to Vishenki, a neighboring village. It was obviously symbolic of a different scenario. The voting station there was in a village club.
It was quite calm inside, the hall was almost empty. The wall above the club’s veiled scene had a bas-relief representing the emblem of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. A cardboard trident was hanging above it.
I walked around the club and suddenly heard strange rustle behind the veil (it definitely was an omen of back-door talks after the election). I peered behind the curtain. It turned out that election commission members have already served a festive dinner for themselves, there on the scene.
“Oh! Would you like some coffee?” a commission member offered to me. “The kettle is already boiling.”
While I was drinking coffee, there appeared some movement near the tables with ballots.
“And where are revolution victims here?” asked a female voice.
I became interested in that issue, and moved towards the tables. Everything became clear soon. Vishenki villagers were divided into several lines, depending on the street they live on. The streets in the village are called after Chapaev, Shchors, Kovpak, Kotovsky, and Revolution victims.
The unexpected union of revolutionaries and victims obviously symbolized that the Party of Regions and Our Ukraine—National Self-Defense pro-president bloc might secretly agree to create a broad coalition.
Here, a girl, who came to vote for the first time in her life, entered the voting station.
“Miss, who votes for the first time, gets a present!” gladly said the election commission’s head, and gave a bunch of flowers to the girl.
Meanwhile, I moved on to the next village. It was called Martusovka. There were two voting stations there. One – in a jail located on the village territory, another – in a village club. That definitely was a symbol of a certain transition from criminal life to social life.
Tired men in military uniform were sitting in front of the jail. They said that all prisoners have already voted in the morning, and that there was nothing more for me to see there. So, I had to go to the club, which was next to a church.
Head of that voting station, Vladimir Valerievich Kondratenko, was very glad to have guests. He immediately introduced me to an observer, who resembled the chairman in appearance, but was younger. His name is Valery Vladimirovich Kondratenko. We sat down on a bench, and Vladimir Valerievich began telling me about life, complaining about low pension, and introducing the arriving voters in a whisper. He introduced most of them as “old communists”. No wonder, though: the voters indeed were quite old. An old woman, before entering a dimly-lit booth, found where the Communist party was in the ballot (number 14), and pressed her finger to that spot. That was eloquent evidence that the Party of Regions and its ally the Communist Party of Ukraine have a good chance to retain power in their hands, not letting the orange forces into the coalition.
However, just like in Vishenki, a girl who voted for the first time came to the voting station. At first, it seemed to me it was the same girl as in the previous village. However, that one was wearing a skirt, and this one was in jeans. She received a box of sweets, her cheeks colored; she took the ballot, marked something in it quickly, and dropped it into the urn.
Yet, urns in Ukraine are made of clear plastic. The ballot fell so that it was impossible not to see for whom the girl had voted. The tick was by number 8, the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc.
All villagers who came to the club watched her go away, smiling. The girl came out, sat on her bike, and rode off. I decided not to be guessing of what it might be a symbol.
Mikhail Zygar
All the Article in Russian as of Oct. 01, 2007
|
