Ukraine’s presidential election. Second time lucky

The presidential election will be decided by a run-off. Probably

UKRAINE, says an aide to Victor Yushchenko, one of two remaining candidates for his country's presidency, is not quite a banana republic. Grotesquely corrupt, maybe; flawed, the first round of its presidential election on October 31st certainly was. But there are limits to what malpractice can do. For all their efforts, which allegedly included two assassination bids, Mr Yushchenko's foes could not stop him advancing in a strong position to a second round, due on November 21st.

His opponent will be Victor Yanukovich, the prime minister and choice of Leonid Kuchma, the outgoing president. Mr Yushchenko, a former head of the central bank, was himself prime minister in 1999-2001, though he later turned against Mr Kuchma. With the results of 98% of polling stations audited, Ukraine's central election commission said that each Victor had won just under 40% of the vote. The commission then suspended its count, perhaps because it was reluctant to acknowledge that Mr Yushchenko might be ahead.

Mr Yushchenko's allies insist that he did far better than the official tally allows - and even that he may have secured the 50% needed for outright victory. According to the most reliable exit poll, he beat Mr Yanukovich by six points. But some votes, it appears, counted for more than others, and some did not count at all. Many Ukrainians could not vote because of mistakes on the electoral rolls; others seem to have voted more than once. Officials on local electoral commissions are said to have been intimidated. Western observers criticised these failings, as did the European Union and America.

It is also impossible to know how Ukrainians might have voted if the run-up to the poll had not involved state-sponsored bullying, and if media coverage were not so heavily skewed in Mr Yanukovich's favour. Serhiy Tihipko, chairman of Mr Yanukovich's campaign, argues that his candidate's exposure merely reflected his work as prime minister. But many in Ukraine's media disagree: dozens of journalists working for television channels controlled by Mr Kuchma or his allies called last week for an end to censorship.

That might yet help to make the second round fairer than the first. Problems with the rolls and with multiple voting may be considered by Ukraine's parliament. And the omission of the 22 other candidates from the first round should improve the atmosphere. Several were of dubious provenance, and used their statutory air-time to attack Mr Yushchenko. Russia's influence on proceedings may also wane.

Presumably because of Mr Yushchenko's greater enthusiasm for joining NATO and the EU, Russia's Vladimir Putin more or less openly backed Mr Yanukovich. Since the vote, Mr Putin has moved hastily to make it easier for Ukrainians to work in Russia, and to hold dual citizenship, which Mr Yanukovich has also pledged to introduce. But such gestures may make little difference at this late stage.

Moreover, despite the physical effects of what he says was a deliberate poisoning in September, Mr Yushchenko should best his slower-witted opponent in the televised debates now being planned. Olexiy Haran, a political scientist at the Kiev-Mohyla Academy, detects signs of nervous hedging by oligarchs and power-brokers, who had assumed a Yanukovich win.

Whether that still materialises might depend on what happens to the supporters of the ejected socialist and communist candidates, who between them took 11% of the first-round vote. On the other hand, those in Mr Kuchma's government with most to lose should Mr Yushchenko win may yet risk a little banana republicanism - more aggressive vote-rigging, or violent disturbances - to keep him out.

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