DEMOCRACY IN UKRAINE

The people take charge

Ukrainian polls opened at 7 a.m. today. There are 33,000 polling stations border to border. Our team met in the hotel lobby at 6:30 a.m.

The first polling station on our list was close by — station #119. The first voters were waiting to get in. We produced our credentials.

The station chief read the whole card front and back then wrote down every detail. He was glad to have Americans here and was very friendly.

This station is in the lobby of a technical/trade college. Ballots were being laid out when we got there. There are four clear Plexiglas voting boxes. Each has a "control letter" taped to the bottom.

There are 6 voting booths. There are 5 ballots. The national ballots are three feet long. All others are two feet long. It is expected to take 15 minutes per voter.

We interview the station chief. "How many of your commissioners showed up today?" 23 out of 25 — and the 2 others arrive late.

There are observers from various political parties around the room. At least for #119, the expected shortage of commissioners is not materializing.

I ask a commissioner to hold up a 3? ballot and snap a photo. I ask the commissioner, "do you anticipate any problems here?" He says yes.

There's a woman in his constituency who last week found she was not registered to vote. Yesterday she produced a court order to allow her to vote. The chief told her she could vote.

Then he double-checked with the regional voting commission. The Commission ordered him not to let the woman vote. He is anxious about her arrival later in the day. "It's not going to be pleasant," he tells me.

These people are all very friendly. Smiles everywhere. With two pages of notes and comments on key items, we say goodbye to our new friends.

Former U.S. Congressman Bob Schaffer, a member of the Colorado State Board of Education, is an election observer for the Parliamentary elections in Ukraine. The election is coming up this Sunday, March 26.