Democratic Initiatives Foundation to announce results when polls close
The 2004 presidential elections were challenged and confirmed by avariety of contradictory exit polls, most of which initially said that then-Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych had won. However, this year the number of organizations providing an alternative score of votes is likely to be more clear-cut and limited.
Democratic Initiatives Foundation (DIF), a non-governmental organization funded by Western embassies and donors, was the only exit pollster to put President Viktor Yushchenko, then a candidate, ahead of Yanukovych in the controversial first round in 2004.
“We don’t expect big problems this time,” said DIF Director Ilko Kucheriv, adding, however, that the March 26 election has been poorly organized.
In the third round of the 2004 presidential elections, DIF covered 360 polling stations and questioned 30,000 voters, coordinating a coalition of two polling companies: the Razumkov Center of Economic and Political Studies and the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS). This year DIF will work with the same two organizations.
On March 26, DIF, Razumkov and KIIS will visit 300 polling stations and question 18,000 voters. The margin of error will be up to 3.2 percent. Results will be announced when polls close at 22:00, the earliest allowed by Ukrainian law.
As in 2004, DIF plans to conduct so-called secret ballot polls, whereby voters will anonymously fill out forms resembling ballots.
This methodology caused confusion during the 2004 election, as other pollsters, including two organizations originally part of the DIF consortium, challenged their accuracy. After the first round, Socis and Social Monitoring, which conducted face-to-face interviews showing Yanukovych ahead in the first round, broke off from the DIF consortium.
“This issue was used to discredit us,” said Kucheriv, adding that “other polls [in 2004] were dishonestly held with the goal of disorienting voters in favor of Yanukovych.”
This and other problems are unlikely to be an issue during the March 26 election, Kucheriv said.
“Unlike during the last elections, there is no pressure on us and people aren’t afraid to answer the questions anymore.”
During the 2004 poll, most pollsters used face-to-face methodology. Their results varied significantly from those of DIF.Kucheriv said that to his knowledge, only one other firm was to conduct an exit poll this year.
