SDPU(o) to Count Election Votes

Viktor Medvedchuk, Deputy Chairman of Verkhovna Rada and SDPU(o) leader, says his party will conduct an alternative count of votes in the 2002 parliamentary elections, Forum reports. “The law that we have passed and want the president to sign envisions that observers or electoral commission members be given the vote tally records,” he noted last Wednesday after meeting Polish Ambassador Marek Ziolkowski. Commenting on the likelihood of the president vetoing the new law because some of its provisions could be unconstitutional, the first vice speaker reiterated, “It is only the Constitutional Court of Ukraine that can rule whether or not a law complies with the Constitution of Ukraine.” He also wants “the law to be signed” and the election campaign be carried out under the new law. But even if “the law is not signed,” the election campaign will start on October 12, Mr. Medvedchuk emphasized: “We will do our best to get the newly-worded law signed by the President.”