Vadim Rabinovich - sensation of the 2014 presidential elections in Ukraine

The most brilliant result of the participation of a Jewish candidate in this presidential election: Vadim Rabinovich received more votes throughout Ukraine than both leaders of the Ukrainian ultranationalists.

The first exit polls for the presidential elections in Ukraine brought sensational results on the evening of May 25, 2014: Petro Poroshenko becomes head of state in the first round, receiving more than 50 percent of the vote. The rest of the promoted politicians and leaders of major parties share places from second to sixth, but in seventh place is a completely new presidential candidate Vadim Rabinovich, president of the All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress.

Rabinovich’s exit poll gives more than two percent of the vote, bringing him closely to the candidate of the recently ruling Party of Regions, Mikhail Dobkin, with his three percent of the vote. Rabinovich overtook even the glorified activist of the Maidan Olga Bogomolets.

After the publication of the exit poll results, People’s Deputy of Ukraine Nikolai Tomenko called “the biggest surprises of the elections are the high results of Oleg Lyashko and Vadim Rabinovich.” In his opinion, Rabinovich’s results are explained by the fact that “he gave a harsh assessment, but in an intelligent way.” “He said the same thing as Lyashko, but aesthetically, competently, popularly explaining what was happening,” Tomenko said.

It can be assumed that not only his outstanding personal qualities and oratorical skills played in favor of Vadim Rabinovich, but also two other factors: the Ukrainian community’s positive perception of the active participation of Jews in the Maidan movement and the firmly pro-Ukrainian position of the current governor of Dnipropetrovsk region Igor Kolomoisky. All these factors work today in Ukraine for a positive image of Jews and reduce the percentage of anti-Semitism in society.

Election of the President of Ukraine showed that the Ukrainian people after the Maidan rose to a new level of civic consciousness. Vadim Rabinovich managed to prove that the Jewish origin of the talented candidate is no longer an insurmountable obstacle to gaining popularity among the broad masses of Ukrainian voters.

But the most brilliant result of the participation of the Jewish candidate in these presidential elections is the fact that Vadim Rabinovich received more votes throughout Ukraine than both leaders of Ukrainian ultranationalists combined. Thus, Oleg Tyagnybok from the Svoboda party received only 1,16 percent of the vote, and the leader of the Right Sector, Dmytro Yarosh, only 0,7 percent of the vote.

Propagandists from the Russian media, who have been trumpeting for months about “mass rampant fascism and neo-Nazism in Ukraine,” must now swallow their microphones in shame - for there is no greater refutation of their speculations and myths than the victory of a Jewish candidate over both leaders of Ukrainian nationalist organizations.

According to the final vote count on 28 in May, 2,26 percent of Ukrainian voters voted for Vadim Rabinovich.