Opposition leader Victor Yanukovych claimed victory in Ukraine's presidential elections on Sunday and told his bitter rival Yulia Tymoshenko to resign as prime minister, but she refused to concede
Yanukovych, 59, a beefy ex-mechanic who wants better ties with Moscow, promised quick reforms to overcome Ukraine’s deep economic crisis after exit polls and initial results gave him a lead of several points over Tymoshenko.
"I think that Yulia Tymoshenko should prepare to resign. She understands that well," Yanukovych said in a television interview.
First official results, with five percent counted, gave Yanukovych 54 percent against 41 percent for longtime rival Tymoshenko. Exit polls but him 3-4 percent ahead.
Tymoshenko was the co-architect of Ukraine’s 2004 Orange Revolution, when mass street protests overturned an initial Yanukovych election victory tainted by fraud.
Former gas tycoon Tymoshenko, 49, was in no mood to give up this time either. Looking stern before reporters, she said her team was conducting a "parallel count" and urged them to "fight for every result, every document, every vote."
Legal challenges and street protests from Tymoshenko could further delay Ukraine’s chances of repaying over $100 billion (64 billion pounds) of foreign debt and nursing its sickly economy back to health after a 15 percent collapse last year.
In Russia, Ukraine’s former Soviet master and the source of the gas which flows through its pipeline network to the West, the election was closely watched but state-controlled media avoided taking sides.
ORANGE REVOLUTION
Sunday’s vote appeared to reflect a widespread feeling among Ukrainians that the Orange Revolution, which Tymoshenko co-led, failed to deliver prosperity or stability and instead led to constant political squabbling and deep economic crisis.
President Victor Yushchenko, the other leader of the Orange Revolution, was eliminated from voting in the first round of the election after coming a humiliating fifth. He lauched a series of bitter personal attacks on his former ally Tymoshenko.
Voters were unenthusiastic about either candidate but seemed to feel Yanukovych, a former premier who stressed the fight against poverty, had the best chance of restoring order.
"We lost five years of our lives thanks to Yushchenko and Tymoshenko," said Oleg Nochvyn, a miner in his 50s in the eastern region of Donetsk.
"For five years they were promising us — tomorrow will be better. Well, I get up the next day and it’s worse than the day before … Under Victor Fyodorovich (Yanukovych) we had everything — economic growth, everything was getting better."
The economy has been battered by a decline in the value of Ukraine’s steel and chemicals exports that has hammered the hryvnia currency, slashed budget revenues and undermined the domestic banking system.
Regardless of the outcome of Sunday’s election, squabbling and intrigue were set to continue.
Before polls closed, Tymoshenko’s camp said it would contest results in around 1,000 polling stations in the eastern Donetsk region, the industrial power base of Yanukovych.
Deputy Prime Minister Oleksander Turchynov, Tymoshenko’s campaign chief, complained of multiple voting and bribery.
Volodymyr Mayevsky, head of the Interior Ministry’s public security department, told a news conference that voting "got underway smoothly, without blatant violations of public order" but Tymoshenko’s team took a different view.
Investors want a new president who will be able to resume borrowing from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF put lending on hold in frustration at political squabbling and concerns about budget spending.
The 2010 budget has still not been approved and the country has had no confirmed finance minister since February 2009, when veteran Victor Pynzenyk resigned saying he could no longer do the job amid the political infighting in Kyiv.
Reflecting the unhappiness of many Ukrainians, a group of semi-naked women overran the polling station where Yanukovych voted with placards saying "Stop raping the country," asking people not to "sell" their votes.
