Ukrainians expected to approve three of four referendum proposals (04/16/00)

Ukrainians expected to approve three of four referendum proposals

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Ukrainians will overwhelmingly support three of the four proposals presented in the April 16 referendum, according to a political poll released on April 10.

The sociological survey, conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology associated with the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, found that Ukrainians may reject only the proposal for a bicameral Parliament. (For the text of referendum questions see page 3.)

The poll, which questioned 1,935 individuals in 117 villages, towns and cities in all the regions of Ukraine, found that only 43 percent of respondents supported the restructuring of the Verkhovna Rada into two chambers, while 25 percent were categorically opposed. Furthermore, a full 31 percent noted that it was difficult for them to say at the moment how they would vote.

The survey found that Ukrainians overwhelmingly support the three other questions, which would change the make-up of today's Verkhovna Rada and give the president additional powers. Ninety- two percent said they favored the proposal to reduce the number of national deputies in the Verkhovna Rada from 450 to 300, while 83 percent voiced support for a limit on the immunity from criminal prosecution that lawmakers now enjoy.

On the issue of the ability of the president to dismiss the Parliament should it not be able to form a majority in a month's time or pass a budget in three months, the support, though less strident, also was unambiguous. Fully 63 percent of the respondents said they favored the proposal, while 19 percent said they could not support it. Seventeen percent said that it was difficult to say at the moment how they would vote.

What is less certain is whether a sufficient number of voters will turn out to validate the results. At least 50 percent of voters must cast a ballot for the referendum to be considered valid.

In the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology poll, 45 percent of the respondents said they would definitely take part in the April 16 vote, while another 18 percent answered that they probably would cast a ballot. Another 11 percent said they had not yet decided, while 22 percent said they definitely would not vote and 4 percent said they probably would not.

The results parallel predictions by the Institute of Politics, which found that some 60 percent of voters would most probably take part in the referendum.

Volodymyr Paniotto, assistant director of the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, said the biggest problem the voters will have is understanding the issues. He even suggested that it is possible the results of his survey may be tainted to an extent by voters' confusion.

"I believe that some of them answered in the affirmative simply because they did not want to show that they did not understand the questions," said Mr. Paniotto. "I would have never structured the questions in the way they are presented."

President Leonid Kuchma in January had signed an executive decree authorizing a national referendum after a petition gathering effort resulted in nearly 4 million signatures in support of such an initiative in two-thirds of the oblasts of Ukraine.

The national referendum, which has caused friction with the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe over the constitutionality of the national poll and the questions presented, originally involved six proposals. However, Ukraine's Constitutional Court declared two of them unconstitutional in a March 29 ruling, and they were subsequently thrown out by President Kuchma.

The court's decision stemmed some of the criticism that had emanated from Europe and within the country on the way in which the referendum had been organized, including the manner in which the questions had been developed.

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