"Orange Revolution" grows (11/28/04)

HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS IN UKRAINE DEMAND FAIR ELECTION

"Orange Revolution" grows

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV (November 24) - In what is quickly becoming known as the Orange Revolution, millions of Ukrainians demonstrated in towns and cities across the central and western regions on November 24 - more than a half million in Kyiv alone for a third day running - calling for state authorities to recognize that presidential elections had been rigged.

Ukrainians undertook the mass actions as expressions of disagreement with the flagrant and extensive violations that took place in the presidential election. Protesters were demanding that state authorities recognize their candidate, National Deputy Viktor Yushchenko, as the winner of the presidential elections.

The peaceful mass demonstrations began after it became apparent that Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych had taken a dubious victory in the election of November 21, achieved only through extensive and systemic fraud and vote manipulation by state and government authorities. The Central Election Committee announced on November 22 that preliminary results showed Mr. Yanukovych had beaten Mr. Yushchenko by 2.7 percent.

Students of all Kyiv universities and many more across the country were on strike. Many shops and cities remained closed. Tent cities mushroomed along the entire stretch of the Kyiv's main thoroughfare, the Khreschatyk, and on the perimeter of the territory of the Presidential Administration Building.

Demonstrations of angry citizens in dozens of Ukrainian towns and cities - from 10,000 in Odesa to 110,000 in Lviv and 100,000 in Kharkiv - were quickly spreading eastward in the country. Law enforcement officials remained restrained in responding to the mass protests.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Yanukovych said on November 24 that the government and the state were working in normal fashion.

"There is nothing unusual occurring. Nothing," said Mr. Yanukovych at the opening of the weekly session of the Cabinet of Ministers.

Even so, dozens of buses filled with Internal Affairs Ministry forces encircled the tent city on the Khreschatyk the night of November 24. Channel 5, the television station that had become the prime source of information for most of Ukraine on the developments in Kyiv once the mass disturbances began, aired videotape taken the evening of November 23, which showed tanks and cannons being loaded onto railcars in Zaporizhia, ostensibly headed for Kyiv. There were also reports, one by National Deputy Yulia Tymoshenko who was among the organizers of the peaceful mass demonstrations, that Russian Special Forces were stationed in Kyiv outfitted in Ukrainian military uniforms.

Outgoing President Leonid Kuchma said on November 23 that he was ready to act as an intermediary in negotiations between Mr. Yushchenko and Prime Minister Yanukovych. Ms. Tymoshenko, a leader of the Power of the People electoral coalition formed months ago in support of Mr. Yushchenko's candidacy, said in response that the Yushchenko forces would only negotiate the manner in which the transfer of power would take place giving Mr. Yushchenko presidential authority.

Mr. Yushchenko, speaking the evening of November 23 during one of several addresses over the last days to the mass of humanity that has kept vigil on Independence Square, said that Ukrainian voters had been denied some 3.2 million votes, which he maintained were falsified or manipulated in favor of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych. A day later he blamed President Kuchma and his opponent the prime minister for the crisis in the country.

"Ukraine today stands on the brink. In millions of homes people are wondering who is responsible," stated Mr. Yushchenko during a special session of Parliament.

He then added: "Leonid Kuchma is the first person who is responsible because he did not execute his responsibilities as the guarantor of the rights of the people. He alone had the unique ability to defend the rights of the voter."

Mr. Yushchenko also blamed his opponent, Mr. Yanukovych, who as the head of government had the responsibility, along with the Central Election Commission, for ensuring that the elections were properly organized.

Mr. Yushchenko noted that some 35 percent of the vote in Mykolaiv Oblast was registered from at-home voting, usually limited to the indigent and shut-ins. He said that another 15 percent of the vote in Mykolaiv came from absentee certificates.

"Sixty percent of the voters in Mykolaiv voted outside their polling stations?" queried Mr. Yushchenko. "We call these fair elections, that there was a fair playing field? This was a crime and Viktor Yanukovych organized it."

Mr. Yushchenko also wondered aloud how it could be that at 8 p.m. the CEC had announced one turnout figure for Donetsk and several hours later it had ballooned. He noted instances in many precincts of Donetsk and Luhansk where the vote results exceeded the number of registered voters. He said the vote in those oblasts should be voided because of the extent of fraud.

Preliminary election results announced by the Central Election Commission showed that Mr. Yushchenko had received 46.7 percent of the national vote while his opponent, Prime Minister Yanukovych, had received 49.4 percent, with 99.4 percent of the vote tallied.

Exit polling done by the think-tank Razumkov Center for Economic and Political Research together with the Kyiv International Institute for Sociology under the direction of the civic organization Democratic Initiatives showed Mr. Yushchenko with a 54 percent to 43.3 percent advantage. The polling firm Socis showed Mr. Yushchenko ahead 49.4 percent to 45.9 percent. Mr. Yushchenko's own parallel vote count had him far ahead of the Ukrainian prime minister. However, Mr. Yanukovych's parallel count and several done by Russian polling organizations showed him ahead by about 3 percent.

International observer teams from the West were in agreement that extensive falsifications had occurred during the November 21 presidential vote. Their observations only added to the dubiousness of the run-off election results after their earlier reports - on the pre-election campaigns and the first round of voting - had indicated a one-sided race with extensive bias in the mass media and illegal use of government resources.

During a special session of the Ukrainian Parliament held on November 23, Mr. Yushchenko symbolically took the oath of office of the president of Ukraine as 191 lawmakers who support his Power of the People election coalition watched. The other 259 lawmakers who make up the Ukrainian legislature failed to turn up for the emergency session of the Parliament, originally called to review the validity of the presidential vote. (See story on page 4).

The organizers have earnestly and repeatedly asked supporters of Mr. Yushchenko to retain discipline within their ranks and avoid emotional responses to incitement. Reports by adherents of Mr. Yushchenko who work within the law enforcement agencies have warned that the government was looking for ways to incite Yushchenko supporters by planting individuals among the masses who would call for illegal and violent actions.

The arrival of dozens of buses from Donetsk, filled with individuals organized by supporters of Mr. Yanukovych, also has caused concern. The Yanukovych supporters, several thousand at most, who loitered for more than a day around the buses, which were parked at the outer edge of the city center, moved to the Cabinet of Ministers Building the morning of November 24. Later that day they had occupied the territory around the Central Election Commission.

A tent city of close to 400 structures inhabited by more than 1,000 supporters of Mr. Yushchenko continued to function on Independence Square. Another 2,000 to 3,000 people guarded the territory after dark to prevent a nighttime assault by law enforcement. Park benches were lined up as a defense perimeter on one side of Independence Square. Demonstration organizers had assured an adequate supply of water and basic foods, even though many protesters jammed cafeterias and fast food eateries nearby for some variety in their diet.

What some predictions had referred to as the looming "Chestnut Revolution" if elections on November 21 were not free and fair had turned into an Orange Revolution, with millions of Ukrainians throughout the country holding mass rallies in most regional centers. And the operative color was orange. Nary a car could be seen in the capital city without an orange ribbon tied to its antenna. Tent city inhabitants wore oversized plastic vests. Other demonstrators wore ribbons around their heads, arms and legs, many all at once. Less active residents simply attached orange ribbons to their lapels or twisted them around their purses.

The mass demonstrations began after Power of the People officials determined early on November 22, as their own parallel vote was taking place and with thousands of complaints of blatant instances of vote fraud and voter intimidation, that the political establishment was going to do whatever it took to retain power. They had earlier called on the people to gather on Independence Square the night of the elections for an all night vigil and public rally to witness parallel vote count.

By morning the rally had become a mass demonstration. At 10:30 a.m. on November 22 that day some 60,000 people had already gathered before the stage on Independence Square when the Power of the People leadership, including Mr. Yushchenko, Ms. Tymoshenko and Oleksander Zinchenko, vice-chairman of the Verkhovna Rada and Mr. Yushchenko's campaign manager, spoke to the masses, decrying the shameless vote fraud taking place. Mr. Zinchenko introduced Mr. Yushchenko as "the newly elected president of Ukraine."

That evening, with more than a quarter million Ukrainians on the square and the CEC already indicating that Mr. Yanukovych was the winner in the unofficial tally, the threesome again took to the stage on Independence Square, again with other Ukrainian leaders in tow, including two former presidential candidates, Socialist Party leader Oleksander Moroz and Party of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs leader Anatolii Kinakh. As they came onto the stage directly from the cars that brought them their, the three leaders broke into smiles and tears as they took their first glimpse of the vast mass of humanity supporting them. Mr. Zinchenko's voice broke as he introduced Mr. Yushchenko.

Mr. Yushchenko noted in his presentation that 10,110 violations had been registered with the Supreme Court of Ukraine He said that 3.2 million votes had been falsified - 1.2 million in Donetsk, 500,000 in Luhansk, 200,000 in Kyiv and another million in the other regions. He said that 30 percent of the vote in Donetsk was fraudulent. He said that while the CEC had refused to issue a count of the number of absentee voter certificates issued, the Power of the People organization believed that up to 700,000 were improperly and illegally utilized.

Mr. Yushchenko said that only 19 of the 2,000 election observers from his organization were allowed to work in Donetsk. After 8 p.m. even they were thrown out of the polling precincts, as were observers in Luhansk. One who refused to leave was handcuffed and placed in a corner.

"It's called elections Yanukovych-style," explained Mr. Yushchenko.

The evening of November 24, after Mr. Yushchenko had taken the oath of office in the Verkhovna Rada and a half-million people had heard him speak on Independence Square, hundreds of thousands marched to the Presidential Administration Building demanding that President Kuchma hold talks with Mr. Yushchenko to arrange for a smooth transfer of power. They were met by lines of dozens of Internal Affairs Ministry Special Forces in riot helmets, wielding shields and billy clubs at the main entrance to the building's territory. While demonstrators adorned the shields held by the young men manning the police line with orange flowers, Ms. Tymoshenko and Mr. Zinchenko negotiated with law enforcement authorities to get into the building.

Eventually the two were allowed to enter the premises and, after further negotiations, the riot police retreated from the barricades. Ms. Tymoshenko told journalists present afterward that officers inside had informed her that special forces of the Russia military were present within the inner court of the building with orders to shoot if the presidential administration compound was invaded.

What had begun in the capital quickly had spun out into the oblasts. By November 24 most oblast centers and many raion centers in western and central Ukraine were the scenes of mass rallies calling for recognition of Mr. Yushchenko as the duly elected president of Ukraine and calling for Mr. Kuchma and Mr. Yanukovych to concede the results. Most of the city councils in oblast and raion capitals had supported resolutions recognizing Mr. Yushchenko as president. Three oblast councils - Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk and Volyn - passed similar resolutions.

Some 150 diplomats in Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, including the head of the press office, Markian Lubkivskyi, issued a statement in which they said they would refuse to carry out directives by the state not in line with the wishes of the people.

The international community and several of its leaders have condemned the Ukrainian presidential vote and in some case voiced support for Mr. Yushchenko. Vaclav Havel, the first president of the Czech Republic and the leader of its Velvet Revolution, sent a letter to Kyiv, read by Mr. Yushchenko on Independence Square the morning of November 23, in which the Czech leader simply stated: "The fate of Ukraine is in your hands. All international organizations agree that your demands are legitimate."

Later that day Georgian President Mikhail Sakashvilli wished the participants in Ukraine's Orange Revolution well. Mr. Shaakashvilli came to power exactly a year ago to date, at the culmination of the Rose Revolution, which deposed President Eduard Shevardnadze after he had claimed re-election victory in a fraudulent election.

"I wish you peace, calmness and victory on this holy day of St. George," stated Mr. Saakashvilli in a video address to the Ukrainian people.

Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski said during a special press conference on November 23 that he had warned the Ukrainian authorities beforehand that the elections would be a test for them. He said they had now failed that test.

Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet leader also chimed in with support for the Orange Revolution. He said that what was occurring in Ukraine had historic significance on a global scale. "What is happening in Ukraine is evidence that a second wall has fallen," said Mr. Gorbachev in a letter to Mr. Yushchenko.

The foreign affairs ministers of Norway, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands and the State Department of the United States issued statements on November 23 calling on Ukrainian authorities to review the process by which the official tally in the November 21 vote was achieved.

Currently only Russia's President Vladimir Putin and Belarus President Alyaksandr Lukashenka have recognized Mr. Yanukovych as Ukraine's new president. Mr. Putin was first, sending his personal congratulations to Mr. Yanukovych on November 22 via phone call from Brazil, where he was on a state visit. He stepped back from the declaration a day later, after he was criticized for not waiting for an official tally, to note that he had in fact merely been congratulating Mr. Yanukovych on his apparent victory based on exit polling.

Meanwhile, President Kuchma condemned the European Union for its condemnation of the Ukrainian vote even before the official results were announced.

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