News Journal: A nod to Ukraine, where the vote really matters

Fifty-two percent of eligible voters turned out for the parliamentary elections held last Sunday in Ukraine. Sad to say, the turnout for our own midterms on Tuesday will be far lower. But that’s part of next week’s column. Right now, I’d like to celebrate a big win for the Ukrainian people and all those who support their aspirations for a free, democratic government.
President Petro Poroshenko’s party didn’t do as well as expected and finished in a tie for first with just over 20 percent of the seats in the Parliament. A number of factors make Poroshenko a big winner anyway. His decision to call for early parliamentary elections, after he won the presidency in May, turned out to be the right strategy. He rid himself of ousted President Viktor Yanukovych’s Parliament, which was generally acknowledged to be corrupt to the core. His biggest win in a multi-party system was that people from the right parties were elected. He will be in an excellent position to deal with both Russian threats and European Union negotiations.
The People’s Front party, led by present Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, tied with Poroshenko’s party with 20 percent of the vote. Yatsenyuk is generally considered to be an excellent manager who is committed to ending corruption and has the expertise to deal with Ukraine’s serious economic and energy challenges.
Poroshenko and Yatsenyuk have announced they are in negotiations to form a coalition government.
The Self Reliance party, led by the mayor of Lviv, Andriy Sadovyi, came in third. I met Sadovyi in May and was impressed. I thought at the time he would be a good candidate for president after Poroshenko leaves office. The leading parliamentary candidate of his party was Hanna Hopko, who led the Maidan reform groups that forced the existing corrupt Parliament to pass real governance and election reforms.
The poor fourth-place performance of the Opposition Bloc, which consists of the remnants of the disbanded Party of Regions that had been led by Yanukovych, was a good sign that Ukrainians are ready to end the corruption endemic during his administration.
The Radical party received less than half the vote predicted. This party supports a much more robust military confrontation with Russia in Donetsk and Luhansk than the Poroshenko government. Its leader has, nevertheless, announced that it would join the coalition government if asked.
The final party to exceed the 5 percent threshold required to organize in the Parliament is the Fatherland party led by former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who must be disappointed at her poor showing.
Finally, one of the most significant indications of political change in Ukraine was the performance of the Communist party. For the first time since the 1917 Russian revolution, the Ukrainian Communist Party did not win a single seat in the Parliament.
The biggest loser in the Ukrainian elections was Russian President Vladimir Putin. Grabbing Crimea and sending Russian special forces into eastern Ukraine alienated the vast majority of the Ukrainian people. He has himself to blame for a new Parliament that will overwhelmingly support Poroshenko in moving the country away from Russia and toward Europe.
The election confirmed the accuracy of earlier polls. Eighty-nine percent of Ukrainians oppose Russia sending troops into their country to “protect” Russian-speaking citizens. That opposition is strong in every region of the country – 78 percent in the east, 89 percent in the south, 93 percent in central Ukraine and 99 percent in the west.
It also transcends language. Seventy-nine percent of Russian speakers and 95 percent of Ukrainian speakers oppose Russia’s actions.
Clearly, this election is hardly a cure-all for Ukraine’s problems. There were no votes cast in the eastern areas around Donetsk and Luhansk, still held by pro-Russian separatists. In fact, Putin is deliberately creating a new crisis by supporting a Sunday election in those areas, an election that will take place under the guns of the separatists.
Nevertheless, this parliamentary election was an important step forward. The results will strengthen Poroshenko’s hand in his negotiations with Russia, because even Putin will have to recognize the vast majority of Ukrainians back their new government. They also will allow the government to focus on Ukraine’s major challenges – fighting corruption and building the economy.
Ted Kaufman is a former U.S. senator from Delaware.

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