Some 43 percent of Ukrainians support the establishment of the local autocephalous Orthodox Church in Ukraine, with the highest number of supporters residing in the western part of the country, a national poll jointly conducted by the Razumkov Center and the Ilko Kucheriv Democratic Initiatives Foundation has shown.
According to the results of the poll, 43 percent of those polled in December support the establishment of the local autocephalous Orthodox Church in Ukraine, and 22 percent do not.
“The share of those who support the establishment of the local autocephalous Orthodox Church in Ukraine has significantly increased compared to May 2018 (at that time 31 percent of the respondents expressed such support) due to a decrease in the share of those who are not interested, and those who are undecided (the total share of such respondents fell from May to December from 49 percent to 35 percent),” the Razumkov Center said.
At the same time, the share of opponents of the establishment of the local autocephalous Orthodox church in Ukraine did not change at a statistically significant level (20 percent in May and 22 percent in December).
The share of those who support the establishment of the local autocephalous Orthodox Church exceeds the share of those who do not support it: in the western region of the country—70 percent and 7 percent respectively and in the central—52 percent and 18 percent of the respondents respectively. In the eastern region, on the contrary, there are more non-supporters (15 percent and 42 percent respectively), while in the southern region their share is not statistically significant (24 percent and 21 percent respectively).
In addition, in the eastern and southern regions, there is a large share of people who are either not interested in this issue or have not decided—those account for 44 percent in the east and 55 percent in the south.
The poll was conducted from December 19 to 25, 2018 in all the regions of Ukraine for the exception of Crimea and the occupied territories in Donbas. A total of 2,017 people aged 18 and above were polled. The margin of error does not exceed 2.3 percent.
