Painter Mykola Danchenko was standing in a tiny voting booth reading his ballot nervously.
Painter Mykola Danchenko was standing in a tiny voting booth reading his ballot nervously.
He was one of the 31 million people who on the winter morning of Dec.1, 1991, were asked to answer one simple question: “Do you support the Declaration of Independence of Ukraine?”
It all started on July 16, 1990, when, following the parliament of the Russian Soviet Republic, which proclaimed sovereignty, the Ukrainian Soviet Parliament passed the Declaration of Sovereignty.
This move carefully opened Independence.
Many already were speaking of democratic reforms. On the morning of Oct. 2, 1990, about 100 students gathered on Maidan Nezalezhnosti in the heart of Kyiv. They put up tents and started a hunger strike, demanding the resignation of the government and new democratic elections.
Weeks later, the government resigned.
Further developments in Ukraine were spurred by events in Moscow, where on Aug. 19 a “gang of eight” high-level officials attempted a coup against Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev.
This move carefully opened Independence.
Turmoil in Russia allowed the Ukrainian parliament on Aug. 24, 1991, to pass the Declaration of Independence of Ukraine, followed by the Dec. 1 national referendum.
Many were surprised that 90.3 percent of the Ukrainian population supported the declaration. In some regions, such as Ternopil and Ivano-Frankivsk Oblasts, more than 98 percent of voters voted yes.
Opinion was much more divided in Crimea, where 54.1 percent supported independence and 42.2 percent voted against it.
Apart from the declaration, voters were asked to elect their first president. Leonid Kravchuk, the former Communist Party member and speaker of parliament, won with more than 61 percent of votes.
“As these were the first democratic elections in my life, and in many people’s lives, the atmosphere was rather nervous. We were both exited and uneasy about the results,” Danchenko recalled.
“When we heard the results, we were startled by how many people voted for independence.”
