Official Ukrainian Election Countdown Thread!

[AcidicFury]

So who do you support, and why? This could be history in the making folks- Each half of the Ukraine is threatening to succeed if their candidate doesn't win. What's your opinion?

Profiles on each of the candidates:

Yanukovych:

KIEV, Ukraine (Reuters) -- Beefy and blunt, the man announced as winner of the presidential contest VIKTOR YANUKOVYCH, 54, has the public backing of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

He has been Ukraine's prime minister since 2002 and is a former governor of the eastern Donetsk region. He also has the backing of outgoing President Leonid Kuchma.

Yanukovych has a reputation as a tough manager able to iron out differences between powerful business groups.

He seeks closer ties with Russia and proposes making Russian an official language alongside Ukrainian.

As prime minister, he increased state regulation of the economy and imposed price controls to resolve a food crisis last year. He promises to at least double average wages and raise pensions with the help of privatization proceeds.

Yanukovych vows to defend a strong hryvnia currency and develop the domestic market while also helping exporters. He says he will cut value added tax from 20 percent to 12 percent.

During the campaign he referred to his liberal rivals as "those bastards who are preventing us from living properly."

Yuschenko:

KIEV, Ukraine (Reuters) -- Former central banker VIKTOR YUSHCHENKO, 50, is the man who introduced Ukraine's new currency, the hryvnia, a buffer to devaluations of the Russian ruble.

Leader of the liberal opposition, the popular economist heads the biggest parliamentary faction, "Our Ukraine."

As central bank chairman from 1993 to 1999, he spearheaded free-market reform. Appointed prime minister in late 1999, he was removed 15 months later in a parliamentary no-confidence vote.

Yushchenko seeks closer ties with the West, while at the same time describing Russia as a "strategic partner."

He promises to create five million new jobs and support private enterprise by cutting taxes and red tape. He says he will fight corruption and force powerful businessmen with political influence to pay taxes.

Yushchenko pledges to guarantee media freedom and secure an independent judiciary.

An admirer of Ukrainian poetry and an avowed patriot, he once said: "If burning myself to ashes could help Ukraine ... I would be happy."

 

[SuperTool]

I would vote for Yanukovich. Yuschenko is already threatening to turn the state judicial apparatus against his political opponents, and enemies of the state as he perceives them, should he win. That doesn't sound like a liberal reformer or independent judiciary supporter to me.
Also, I doubt he is going to accept defeat even if he loses again.