Vitalii Yarema: the Government does its best to ensure elections to be democratic and safe, and results meet the will of citizens

First Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine Vitalii Yarema emphasized that the elections in Ukraine were democratic and safe. He said this during a briefing in the House of Government on Sunday, May 25.

“The Central Election Commission of Ukraine and international observers will make its final conclusion and assessment of elections in the near future, but already now we can say that the Ukrainian Government has done its best to ensure law, order and the possibility of holding elections in all regions of Ukraine,” he said. “We realized that in some places this would be difficult, but these places are few, and generally this will not affect outcomes of the elections,” V.Yarema added.

Speaking about the voting and state of law and order, Vitalii Yarema said that this was the first election in the history of Ukraine, in which the prosecution did not receive complaints about the use of administrative resources.

He noted that during the polling day the law-enforcement bodies fixed a number of minor violations. So, according to the Interior Ministry, they received 112 reports on criminal, administrative offences and other events related to the election process. V.Yarema noted that this is much less than in the 2010 presidential elections (then on the day of the first round of voting, there were 216 reports on criminal, administrative offences).

Giving specific examples, the official noted a number of events associated with damage to the premises or property of election commissions, seizures by unknown of polling stations property, voter’s lists, seals, ballot boxes, etc., committing of hooligan actions against members of the polling station. All these events mainly took place in Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

The First Vice Prime Minister stressed that law enforcement agencies continue to operate in emergency mode, aware of the need to ensure order and security for members of polling stations, who will count the votes and deliver the ballots and protocols to district election commissions. "We spent the polling day, but we have the polling night ahead", V. Yarema underlined. He also assured the residents of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, who came to the polls and had the opportunity to vote, that none of their votes would disappear, and protocols from those voting stations, which managed to hold elections, will be delivered to Kiev under the increased protection of law enforcement officers.