Viktor Yushchenko Promises to Get Back in Shape

Iryna Herashchenko, Presidential Candidate Viktor Yushchenko’s press secretary, refuted 1+1 Channel’s Epicenter information Sunday that Our Ukraine’s leader was down with microinfarction or microstroke. A team of 11 top-notch physicians carried out a thorough examination and diagnosed acute pancreatitis and several more related disorders, “but there wasn’t the slightest sign of microinfarction or microstroke,” Interfax Ukraine quotes Ms. Herashchenko as saying. She added that if the latter were the case, “he wouldn’t be able to reappear in public so soon and communicate with his electorate,” and that Mr. Yushchenko’s condition was getting better with each day.

As earlier reported by the media, Viktor Yushchenko felt ill September 6 and was then under Ukrainian medical surveillance. September 10, he was signed in at the Rudolfinerhaus Clinic in Vienna. At a briefing Friday, his campaign coordinator Oleksandr Zinchenko said that Yushchenko’s food poisoning could be an attempt at his life. Saturday night, however, Viktor Yushchenko returned from Vienna and appeared at a large rally under the motto We’ll Win Together in the capital’s European Square. He did look ill and this brought forth the allegation of his suffering from microinfarction or microstroke. Addressing the rally, the presidential candidate said that his life had been in danger, but assured that the physicians’ skill and his electorate’s moral support would bring him back in shape very soon. Viktor Yushchenko also made several program statements. He promised to make every effort to execute a peaceful power transfer, without any cataclysms or acts of violence. He also declared that all those guilty of falsifications and intimidation of his fellow citizens would be punished under the law. Speaking of his plans, the presidential candidate said he would not offer a program promising positive changes in several dozen years, but that he had a simple action plan easily understood by one and all: Taking ten steps toward the people.