Posted on January 18, 2010 - by Venik

Viktor Yanukovich wins first round of Ukraine election

Villain of 2004 Orange Revolution will face Yulia Tymoshenko in presidential run-off, while incumbent Yushchenko is wiped out

Viktor Yanukovich, Ukraine’s opposition leader and the villain of the 2004 Orange Revolution, is on the brink of a stunning political comeback after opening up a commanding 11-point lead in Sunday’s first round of the presidential election.

According to Ukraine’s election commission, Yanukovich was ahead with 35.51% of the vote. In second place, with 24.88%, was Yulia Tymoshenko – Ukraine’s prime minister and Yanukovich’s bitter rival.

As neither won 50%, they will face a run-off vote on 7 February.

Ukraine’s unpopular incumbent president, Viktor Yushchenko, has been ousted from power, coming fifth with 5.41%.

The results, with 85% of the vote counted, confounded some exit polls that suggested a much narrower gap between the two leading candidates.

International observers have warmly praised the election as a significant step forward from the fraud-marred poll of 2004 in which Yanukovich tried to rig the result, triggering the mass protests in Kiev’s Independence Square that became the Orange Revolution.

At a press conference in Kiev, Heidi Tagliavini, the head of the OSCE election observer mission, described the poll as “mostly in line with international standards”. Despite some “shortcomings”, observers said the election, contested by 18 candidates, had been “good, clean and competitive”.

Pawel Kowal, head of the observer delegation from the European parliament, said: “The people of Ukraine had a genuine democratic choice.”

Both leading candidates have claimed victory. Tymoshenko predicted she would win the support of “democratic voters” in the second round and defeat the “stone age” Yanukovich. She promised to continue Ukraine’s integration with Europe.

But analysts have suggested it will be an uphill task for Tymoshenko, who has been grappling with a severe economic crisis, to close the yawning gap with Yanukovich. They have predicted that whoever loses is likely to bitterly contest the result, going to court and possibly the streets.

“I would say that Yanukovich has a very high chance to win this game,” Sergiy Taran, director of the International Democracy Institute in Kiev, told the Guardian.

“This isn’t because of Yanukovich but because of the constant fight in the post-Orange camp and the lack of economic reforms conducted by the Orange camp.”

Others said the generally low-key and trouble-free election was a sign of Ukraine’s growing political maturity. Unlike in 2004, when the Russian-speaking east overwhelmingly backed Yanukovich and the west plumped for Tymoshenko, voting patterns were less polarised and more diffuse.

“Ukraine is becoming more open,” said Sergiy Yevtushenko, the director of Ukraine’s foreign investment agency. “Political shows beat football games in terms of popularity. Ukraine is on its way to becoming a normal European country.”

Yevtushenko said that the “hate” that characterised the 2004 poll had ebbed away.

If elected, Yanukovich will seek warmer relations with Moscow. He is dismissed by his enemies as a wooden and gaffe-prone, but he is unlikely to become a Kremlin stooge since this strategy would inevitably damage the economic interests of his key oligarchic backers.

While opposing Ukraine’s Nato membership, he is likely to seek close ties with the European Union.

“Yanukovich is pro-Yanukovich and Tymoshenko is pro-Tymoshenko,” said one senior western official who declined to be named. “They are not pro-Russian. They will try to have good relations with Russia, the US and Europe.”

Both would try to strengthen presidential powers, he said, and to end the executive rivalry between president and prime minister that has paralysed the country over the past five years.

Original article

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