Is Kuchma afraid of low voter turnout? (11/14/99)

Is Kuchma afraid of low voter turnout?

RFE/RL Poland, Belarus and Ukraine Report

PRAGUE - Dmytro Tabachnyk, an adviser to Leonid Kuchma, is quoted in the November 5 issue of the Financial Times as saying that if voter turnout in the November 14 presidential runoff were to be below 55 percent, the incumbent could lose to Communist Party leader Petro Symonenko.

"Our main enemy is passivity," Mr. Tabachnyk said, adding that the main task of the presidential election staff is to persuade young voters to come to the polls. The president's entourage views Ukraine's youth, which is rather passive in the country's political life, as that part of the electorate that could prevent the Communists' return to power.

According to Mr. Tabachnyk, 30 to 40 percent of the electorate would rather see any candidate other than Kuchma in office.

Political analyst Mykhailo Pohrebynskyi voiced a similar opinion on November 4 when he told journalists that "if only 35 percent of the electorate turns out, then Symonenko will be president." However, Mr. Pohrebynskyi added that if turnout is approximately the same as in the first round, President Kuchma could easily win with the 14 percent margin between himself and Symonenko that was registered in the 31 October 31 first round.

President Kuchma himself admitted in an interview with Fakty on October 5 that there is a "very large protest electorate" in Ukraine and that his re-election "will not be easy." He added that the runoff should be seen as a "fight of ideologies" rather than as a duel between individuals.

Meanwhile, the Kyiv-based Social Monitoring Center, has predicted that turnout on November 14 will be even higher than in the first round and will reach 78 percent.

According to Ukraine's presidential election law, the candidate who obtains the most votes in the runoff becomes president (regardless of how many voters participate in the ballot).

If one candidate withdraws from the race earlier than seven days before the runoff date, the candidate who came in third in the first round (in this case Oleksander Moroz) would be offered the opportunity to take part.

If a candidate withdraws from the race later than seven days before the runoff date, the runoff takes place with the only remaining candidate, who must obtain more than 50 percent of the votes cast to become president. If he fails to do so, the Verkhovna Rada must set a date for new elections.

New elections are also called if two candidates in the second round obtain an equal number of votes.

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