Ukraine shifts focus to polling booth

Yushchenko wants Yanukovich, officially on vacation, to resign from his job as prime minister and for Ukraine's reluctant Rada, or parliament, to pass laws aimed at making the next round of the elections more transparent and tamper-resistant. The main sticking point is that Yushchenko has alienated some of his own allies, especially Socialist leader Oleksandr Moroz, by reneging on an earlier pledge to couple sweeping constitutional reforms, which would weaken presidential powers and strengthen parliament, with the electoral legislation.

"The point of view in Yushchenko's camp right now is, 'Why should we make concessions when the victory should have been ours in the first place?' " says Oleksandr Chernenko, an expert with the Committee of Ukrainian Voters, a nongovernmental group. Mr. Chernenko warns that the drift to compromise might yet be derailed. "The 'parties of war' prevail now in both camps. On Yushchenko's side, many doubt the usefulness of talking with Yanukovich at all," he says.

The street protesters, especially the militant student core, are another potential wild card. "Nobody here wants new elections with Yanukovich, the destroyer of Ukraine," says Jemma Koblenz, who speaks for a group of students from Lvov.

"These compromises are not good, even for Yushchenko. If we don't start to see some progress, we'll take some radical actions. We'll go home when we have victory. Not before, even if Yushchenko tells us to go."

Expert say it's ironic that Kuchma is championing constitutional changes that would redress the imbalance between president and parliament, after a decade in office that has seen him amass vast powers. Nevertheless, many see the reforms as crucial to prevent Ukraine from sliding into one-man rule as neighboring Russia and Belarus have done. But opposition leaders view the issue as an attempt to steal Yushchenko's imminent victory.

"[The draft law] stipulates that the Rada will get practically all powers of the president. If it's approved, the presidential elections will lose all meaning," Yuliya Tymoshenko, a top Yushchenko ally, told the Russian Nezavisimaya Gazeta Tuesday. "This would betray millions of people who are struggling for Yushchenko's victory."

But some pro-Yushchenko demonstrators say they like the idea of constitutional changes that would make Ukraine more like the parliamentary states of Western Europe. "A stronger parliament would be a very good thing in this country," says Ms. Koblenz. "It's just that the parliament we have right now is a bad one. Maybe we need to change it too, after we have a new president."

Like many of the students camped out on Kiev's main streets, Koblenz says she and her friends are not there to support Yushchenko, but to change Ukraine.

"Yushchenko is the best leader we have, but if he changes his position we'll go against him in a minute," she says. "What we want is a free Ukraine, a democratic country where the people rule. That's what we're proving here."

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