Exit polls signal Ukraine’s shift to west
Ukraine’s parliamentary elections on Sunday cemented the country’s westward shift away from Moscow’s influence, with exit polls suggesting the new parliament would for the first time be dominated by parties staunchly backing EU integration. National exit polls from four reputable pollsters showed President Petro Poroshenko’s eponymous election bloc gaining between 22.2 per cent and 23.2 per cent of the vote, slightly lower than pre-election opinion polls had suggested. Prime minister Arseniy Yatseniuk’s Popular Front party looks to have done better than expected, on 19.7 per cent to 21.8 per cent, leaving Mr Yatseniuk well-placed to retain the premier’s job. Samopomich, a new pro-western party founded by Andriy Sadovy, the mayor of Lviv in western Ukraine, and composed largely of new political faces, was shown in third place on between 11 per cent and 14.2 per cent. The Radical party of Oleh Lyashko and the Opposition Bloc, including former associates of ousted president Viktor Yanukovich, were vying for fourth place, ahead of the party of ex-premier Yulia Tymoshenko and the nationalist Svoboda party. A constitutional majority – more than three-quarters of voters who took part in the vote – "powerfully and irreversibly supported Ukraine’s path to Europe", Mr Poroshenko said late on Sunday in an address to the nation. Election officials estimated voter turnout at 53 per cent, less than expected. And with voting not taking place in Russian-occupied Crimea and highly populated eastern regions now controlled by Moscow-backed separatists, the election could further strain the national fabric of the war-torn country. Sunday’s vote took place nearly a year after massive pro-EU and anti-corruption demonstrations erupted in downtown Kiev. The demonstrations unleashed a dramatic sequence of events that sparked the toppling of Moscow-backed Mr Yanukovich, Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the Russia-backed separatist uprising in east Ukraine. A complete overhaul of government through snap presidential and parliamentary elections was a central demand of the winter protests on the Maidan, or Kiev’s Independence Square. Protesters viewed EU integration as a chance to break from the Soviet past, years of dysfunctional politics and rampant corruption. Mr Poroshenko said on Sunday he hoped the election would produce a "united, powerful and efficient team to implement reforms and restore peace to Ukraine". The precise final shape of the parliament remains unclear, with half of the 450 seats elected via party lists, but the other half from single-mandate districts. After the annexation of Crimea and with parts of Ukraine’s easternmost Donetsk and Lugansk regions controlled by separatists, elections took place in only 198 out of 225 districts. That deprived about 4.6m people out of Ukraine’s nearly 37m voters of the chance to vote, according to Opora, an election watchdog. Voting was generally reported to have proceeded smoothly, although there were isolated incidents. Two new candidates from Mr Poroshenko’s list, the investigative journalists Serhiy Leshchenko and Mustafa Nayem – an initiator of the Maidan protests – had their car pelted with stones in central Ukraine. The leading pro-western parties were expected to hold swift coalition talks, aimed creating a new government capable of facing the daunting challenges of restoring growth to the war-torn economy, fighting corruption, and reaching agreement with Russia on restoring natural gas supplies. Political leaders of the Maidan protests featured strongly in the election, with Mr Poroshenko’s party list headed by Vitaly Klitschko, the heavyweight boxing champion who became mayor of Kiev after the February revolution. Taras Berezovets, a Kiev political analyst, said: "The backbone parties for a new coalition will be the parties of Poroshenko and Yatseniuk, plus Samopomich, whose surprise strong result shows voters want fresh faces," he added. But Mr Berezovets said a low turnout in Ukraine’s east and other Russian-speaking regions such as the Black Sea port city of Odessa demonstrated disillusionment among voters there. "A pessimistic mood is spreading amid economic recession and inability to end the conflict with Russia," he added. The poor turnout in the east and south may also have reflected the implosion of Mr Yanukovich’s Regions party, which was not contesting the election, after securing 30 per cent in the last parliamentary poll in 2012. Sunday’s vote took place against the backdrop of a shaky ceasefire in the conflict in east Ukraine, which has claimed more than 3,700 lives. Though fighting has continued in defiance of a September 5 ceasefire, it is of lower intensity. Pro-Russia separatists have started entrenching themselves deeper in Donetsk, Lugansk and other cities between the provincial capitals. Separatist leaders plan to hold their own elections in regions they control in November. Many voters in Ukraine’s breakaway east are deeply opposed to Kiev’s new pro-western leaders, blaming them for breaking cultural and business ties with Russia. But patriotism has surged in other parts of the country. "I used to vote Communist and considered Russians our brothers, but Putin’s aggression against our peaceful nation has changed my views," said Nina Federivna, a 78-year-old Kiev pensioner. "I just voted for the Samopomich party because I think their youthful new politicians are best capable of adopting the reforms needed to give our children a better future, a European future." Addressing separatists in eastern Ukraine, she said: "If you like Russia so much, pick up your bags, go there and leave us alone."