Runoff candidates agree to debate
KYIV – Presidential election runoff opponents Petro Poroshenko and Volodymyr Zelensky have provisionally agreed to a debate after the political neophyte and comedian took nearly a third of the first round vote tally on March 31 among 39 candidates.
The official results of the presidential election’s first round haven’t been announced, but all the votes were tabulated as of April 4, with Mr. Zelensky garnering 30.24 percent of the 18.9 million ballots cast – more than the combined total of the next two vote-getters. Mr. Poroshenko received 15.95 percent of the vote, and Ms. Tymoshenko got 13.40.
Behind them were: Yuriy Boiko with 11.67 percent of the vote, Anatoliy Hrytsenko with 6.91 percent, Ihor Smeshko with 6.04 percent, Oleh Lyashko with 5.48 percent, Oleksandr Vilkul with 4.15 percent and Ruslan Koshulynsky with 1.62 percent. The rest of the field received under 1 percent of the vote.
Mr. Zelensky received a plurality of votes in all oblasts of Ukraine except Lviv and Ternopil, which supported Mr. Poroshenko; Ivano-Frankivsk, which went for Ms. Tymoshenko; and Luhansk and Donetsk, which were carried by Mr. Boiko.
The presidential election now goes to a runoff between the top two candidates on April 21.
Presidential Administration of Ukraine
President Petro Poroshenko gestures after voting in Kyiv on March 31 together with First Lady Maryna Poroshenko.
As it appears, the electorate might get to watch a contest of words between an anti-establishment candidate and a veteran politician who has touted experience and accomplishment over the fear of the unknown in his adversary.
Mr. Poroshenko, 53, didn’t debate ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko when they ran for the country’s highest office in 2014. Fugitive ex-President Viktor Yanukovych also declined to spar with Ms. Tymoshenko when they faced off in 2010.
President Poroshenko first challenged his opponent on election night at his campaign headquarters in the Mystetskyi Arsenal art complex after the polls closed at 8 p.m.
“The debates should be the key element of the election in the second round,” Mr. Poroshenko said, looking exhausted, yet relieved. “If someone avoids debates, it means that he has nothing to say.”
Adding that the “jokes [have] ended,” he referred to Mr. Zelensky as a creature of Ihor Kolomoisky, a billionaire whose television channel for seven years has broadcast the upstart politician’s comedy shows and sitcom in which he plays a history teacher-turned-accidental president.
“I’m not ashamed to say – I was destined to meet in the second round with a puppet of Kolomoisky,” he said, adding that he wants “to complete what was started, not to ruin what was done and not to waste what was hard won by people…”
On April 3, Mr. Zelensky accepted the challenge with a video published on social media. Among his conditions is the candidates take medical examinations prior to the debate “to prove to the people that among them there are no alcoholics or drug addicts.”
He proposed Kyiv’s 70,000-capacity Olympic Stadium as the venue instead of the state-run TV studio as stipulated by the presidential election law.
Seen walking onto the pitch of the empty stadium used for soccer matches and musical concerts, Mr. Zelensky furthermore demanded an apology from his competitor that he is not a “puppet of the Kremlin or Kolomoisky…a clown or a ‘little Russian.’ ”
That same night, Mr. Poroshenko released his own video shot outside the Presidential Administration where he said he and his opponent are “two different people with two different geopolitical orientations.”
He continued: “My country is a strong European country that won’t ever, under any circumstances, kneel down before anyone.”
Implying that the unproven politician is trying to provoke him, the chocolate mogul said that “debates aren’t a show…there’s no room here for jokes. To be a president and commander-in-chief isn’t a game or desire to be appealing to someone.”
The Central Election Commission (CEC) said the two candidates’ public accord to debate could be in violation of election law because it can be construed as campaigning given that the official first-round results haven’t yet been announced.
CEC Deputy Chairman Yevhen Radchenko said that two articles of the election law regulate presidential debates. One stipulates that the debate takes place two days before the runoff (April 19) and on the state-run broadcaster that is funded from the state budget. Crimean-born journalist Pavlo Kazarin was named moderator for the event.
The other applies to “election campaigning, which is regulated by Article 58 of the law on presidential elections regarding the conduct of public debates, discussions and press conferences,” he told Interfax-Ukraine news agency. In that case, such events are financed by the respective candidates’ campaign funds.
Although he announced his candidacy only three months ago, on New Year’s Eve, Mr. Zelensky has surprised a field of old political faces with a vague platform and a campaign that has eschewed public rallies and town halls. Focusing more on giving regular skit show performances and a slick social media presence, he has also been highly selective in giving interviews.
Volodymyr Zelensky campaign
Joined by his spouse, Olena Zelenska, lead presidential candidate Volodymyr Zelensky gives a speech after the polls closed on March 31 at the Parkovy Congress and Exhibition Center in Kyiv.
Mr. Kolomoisky told the Israeli newspaper Makor Rishon in an article published on March 21 that his longtime contractual partner had planned to run for president in 2015 when the first season of “Servant of the People,” in which he plays a fictional president, premiered.
By 2017 he had informed Mr. Kolomoisky “that he was going to run for president… After that, I thought, ‘Actually, why not?’” the Jewish-Ukrainian businessman said in the interview.
Mr. Zelensky’s contract with the businessman’s 1+1 channel runs through 2022, Mr. Kolomoisky told the Israeli newspaper.
The front-runner, who could become Ukraine’s first Jewish president, didn’t respond to an e-mailed request for comment regarding this interview.
The Zelensky campaign has promised to release a more elaborate list of advisers and policy papers before the runoff. Reformers Oleksandr Danyliuk, a former finance minister, and ex-Economy Minister Aivaras Abromavicius have guided him so far.
His political consultant is Dmytro Razumkov, the son of Oleksandr Razumkov after whom a prominent think tank is named.
Dmytro Razumkov was a member of the youth wing of the pro-Russian Party of Regions that ex-President Yanukovych led.
In an interview with gazeta.ua on March 12, 2006, the younger Razumkov said that he joined the party because he was always in favor of making Russian an official language on par with Ukrainian.
Before the first-round of the presidential election, Dmytro Razumkov told Tyzhden magazine that his candidate is for Ukrainian as the sole state language. “There can be no other alternatives,” he said.
Mr. Razumkov was seen on election night at Mr. Zelensky’s headquarters with Andriy Bohdan, a lawyer who has represented Mr. Kolomoisky, and his associate Hennadiy Korban. The lawyer was also Mr. Kolomoisky’s adviser when he was governor of his native Dnipropetrovsk Oblast in the aftermath of the 2014 Euro-Maidan Revolution.
Also a native of Dnipropetrovsk region, Mr. Zelensky was seen playing foosball and table tennis with journalists just minutes before the preliminary exit polls were announced on 8 p.m.
“I thank all Ukrainians who today voted for me not in jest. This is the beginning of a great victory,” he said while standing on stage with his wife Olena Zelenska.
Meanwhile, Mr. Poroshenko has a mountain to climb and now is seen as an underdog.
To secure victory, he said “we need total mobilization of all Ukrainian patriots… of all those who fight for Ukraine, putting aside all political colors, putting aside all the insults, we can unite.”