IUSA sponsors student trip to vote

Trapped in a foreign land while her home country is ravaged by controversy, Ukrainian native Olha Krupa is grateful -- for the IU Student Association.\nShe got the chance to vote in the recent presidential run-off taking place on her native soil despite being in the United States thanks to the efforts of IUSA. The student government's dollars sent the IU doctoral student and six other native Ukrainian IU students to the Ukrainian Consulate twice -- Oct. 31 and Nov. 21 -- to participate in Ukraine's budding democratic process.\nThe opportunity to aid a group of students wishing to voice their concerns and participate in their native electoral process is something IUSA wanted to support, said IUSA Vice President Scott Norman.\n"These students want to express their thoughts, their opinions and their positions affecting their homeland," he said. "We think it is a great thing that students want to voice their opinions, taking (an) interest in issues affecting them, while being so far from home." \nIn the proposal drafted on behalf of the student coalition sent to IUSA to gather funds for the excursion, Krupa noted that the Oct. 31 Ukrainian poll figures showed the former Ukrainian Prime Minister Victor Yushchenko, who is pro-democratic, trailed current Prime Minister Victor Yanukovych, the Russian-backed candidate, by a margin of 49.46 percent to 46.61 percent. Yushchenko called for new elections because of voter fraud and close vote tallies. The election and the subsequent run-offs also mark the first time in history that Ukraine will count absentee ballots.\nNorman said this wasn't the first time a culturally-oriented group approached IUSA for help.\n"We've had cultural groups come to us for funding for a variety of reasons," he said. \nNorman likened the huge push for on-campus voter registration and voter participation in the recent U.S. presidential election with the desires of these seven students who made the trip up to Chicago to vote in their own country's elections.\n"This will have a huge impact on the Ukraine and Europe," he said. "This is definitely not an isolated event. These students want the best leader for the job."\nNorman said student groups should not hesitate to approach IUSA for any help in making their voices heard.\n"If groups need to express their voices and their concerns, they should look to us," he said.\nFor Krupa and the other Ukrainian students, the rumors of election fraud and the need to have every vote count made their proposal even more compelling.\n"There were allegations of fraud before the elections," she said. "If we didn't show up and vote, but sent in an absentee ballot, there was a chance that it would be stolen and go to the wrong candidate. There were major revolts in the Ukraine after the elections because people suspected fraud before, during and after the elections."\nIU doctoral student Victoria Faychuk, who also traveled to Chicago to vote, felt the outcome of the Ukrainian presidential election will have many major implications for the future of the country.\n"Ukraine in this election faced a strategic choice between Russia and Europe," she said in an e-mail interview. She claimed that by forcing another election, she believes the Ukrainian people have spoken in favor of Yushchenko. \n"Now, it is clear that the choice is made," Faychuk said, "and the Russian president was too quick to celebrate his victory."\nKrupa stressed it is important for students and anyone able to vote in any election to do so after seeing the electoral process plagued with problems here in the United States and the Ukraine.\n"People do not have the right to be passive and just let other people elect their leader," she said. "People who don't vote and then complain about the direction of the country will have to blame themselves, not the leader."\n-- Contact staff writer Eric Tash at etash@indiana.edu.