Ukrainians are preparing to go to the polls in snap elections that are expected to dramatically change the make-up of the country's parliament. Polls put incumbent President Petro Poroshenko's bloc in the lead, reports GHN based on DW.
Speaking on the eve of Sunday's poll, President Petro Poroshenko (pictured l. above with ally Vitaly Klitschko) urged voters to elect a majority that would allow Ukraine to break with the Soviet past and push forward with a pro-Europe reform agenda.
"You will see, this will be an entirely new parliament," he said in a televised address on Saturday, adding that the assembly to lead for the next five years should be "reforming, not corrupt, pro-Ukrainian and pro-European, not pro-Soviet."
Almost 36 million Ukrainians in a country of 45 million are registered to vote in the elections - the first parliamentary vote since Moscow-backed leader Viktor Yanukovych was overthrown in February. Poroshenko, who was subsequently elected president by a landslide in May, called Sunday's snap vote in a bid to clear the parliament of Yanukovych loyalists and boost the legitimacy of Kyiv's pro-Western leadership.
Poroshenko said the election would "complete the transfer of power" started by activists who forced a change of leadership after occupying Kyiv's independence square for several months last winter.