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The Tribunal for Putin (T4P) global initiative was set up in response to the all-out war launched by Russia against Ukraine in February 2022.

On the course of voting of 26 December: Gorlovka (the Donetsk region)

10.03.2005   
Aleksandr Bagin, Voters’ Committee of Ukraine, Gorlovka

The procedural changes introduced into the Law “On election of the President of Ukraine” demonstrated their positive and negative features during the repeated voting on 26 December. I am sure that everybody is waiting for the news from the Donets Basin.

1. As a result of the decision of the Constitutional Court, the number of the applications about voting at home was, at some election stations, from 70-80 to 150-200 only during the past evening. As a rule, these stations were headed by representatives of Yanukovich. At other stations the number of such applications was 10-50. One of the negative moments was that many voters, invalids and old people, had to go to the stations. The situations were different, but all of them were very grievous. Although the Party of Regions was the initiator of such strict rules, it got its dividends even there. Representatives of the Party seemed to be benefactors, since they organized transportation of invalids to voting stations. Almost all such people, who wanted to vote, were transported to the stations, although it was difficult for many of them. There were cases, where the old people, who were registered for voting at home, came to the stations all the same in order to be sure that they would have opportunity to vote.

Our MPs did not take into consideration that there were very few invalids of the first group. This group is not always given even to those, who cannot move without assistance. This is done because the pension of invalids of the 1st group is greater. Yanukovich knew about that, so he actively struggled for cancellation of these restrictions. Naturally, the majority of invalids were displeased. Yet, one should understand that the reason of this inconvenience lies in the abuses committed by representatives of the Party of Regions at the previous voting.

2. Some voters were absent in the lists. There were problems connected with courts during the first half of the day. Not all commissions knew that they had to give to the people, turning to courts, the reference on the reasons of the refusal to allow these people to the voting and the letter from the commission, which had to read that the commission did not protest against consideration in absence of a representative of the commission. However, during the second half of the day, these questions were solved, and the commissions even rendered transport. In the morning one had to wait for court decision for 2-3 hours, but later that took only 20-30 minutes.

3. There were many cases, where representatives of V. Yushchenko were not included to the election commissions as heads or secretaries. Yet, this did not influence the work of the commissions.

4. The attendance of voters to the election stations in Gorlovka was 79-86%. However, the greatest proportion was in the election districts, where a significant part of people voted at home. At these stations many applications about voting at home were written by the same hand.

5. On 25 December leaflets, allegedly issued by V. Yushchenko’s supporters, appeared in Donetsk. These leaflets, on behalf of Yanukovich, invited people to the election proposing them to strike Yushchenko’s name from the list and to enter a check near Yanukovich’s name. As a result, such bulletins would be spoilt. We reckon that this was specially prepared discrediting material for further court consideration. They say that Yanukovich did not get the proper number of votes because of this provocation. However, the practice showed that the number spoiled bulletins was very small.

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