President’s party buoyed by exit poll after Ukraine election
— President KIEV, UKRAINE Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s party was headed to win the biggest share of votes in the Ukraine’s snap parliamentary election, according to an exit poll Sunday, but it was unclear if the party nailed down a solid majority in the legislature.
The poll of 13,000 voters showed Servant of the People getting 43.9% of the vote for party-list candidates, far ahead of rivals. But 199 of the 424 seats being filled were for single constituencies, which the poll didn’t assess.
Overall, five parties cleared the 5% threshold necessary to get party-list seats, according to the poll. In all, the parties got less than 80% of the overall vote, suggesting that Zelenskiy’s party was likely to win a majority of the party-list seats.
The vote count was proceeding slowly, with less than 1% of the polling stations’ results tallied 3 1/2 hours after voting ended. Nonetheless, Zelenskiy was buoyed by the exit poll’s findings.
“This shows great trust by the people of Ukraine to our party,” he said.
He said “the main priorities for us and for every Ukrainian are the stopping of war, the return of our prisoners and victory over the corruption that remains in Ukraine.”
Zelenskiy, who took office in May, called the election three months ahead of schedule because the parliament was dominated by his opponents. He is seeking a majority that would support his promised fight against Ukraine’s endemic corruption and for other reforms.
His Servant of the People party is named after the television comedy in which he played a teacher who unexpectedly becomes president.
After voting, Zelenskiy said one of the new parliament’s first tasks should be to consider lifting parliament members’ immunity from prosecution.
A party led by one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest associates, tycoon Viktor Medvedchuk, was in second with 11.5% of the vote, according to the exit poll. It was followed by the European Solidarity party of former President Petro Poroshenko, whom Zelenskiy defeated in a landslide in the country’s spring presidential election.
Zelenskiy’s party intends to continue a pro-Western course toward joining the European Union and NATO, combining this with economic reforms and an intensified fight against endemic corruption.
“With Zelenskiy, a new political team should come into politics that will continue the reforms that Poroshenko spoke about beautifully but did not do,” 35-year-old lawyer Viktor Shumeiko said at a polling station in Kiev.
Medvedchuk says Ukraine’s proper course is to improve its relations with Moscow, which plummeted after Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and its support for Russia-backed separatists fighting government troops in a war that has killed more than 13,000 people.
Dmitry Rushailo, a 57-yearold doctor voting in Kiev, agreed.