Ukrainians split on giving special economic status to Donbass, contested survey shows

Ukrainians overwhelmingly support cutting the number of lawmakers in parliament but are split on whether to give special economic status to the war-hit eastern region of Donbass, a disputed survey by the ruling party said on Monday. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's party commissioned the opinion poll to run alongside Sunday's local elections, posing five policy questions to voters.

Ukrainians overwhelmingly support cutting the number of lawmakers in parliament but are split on whether to give special economic status to the war-hit eastern region of Donbass, a disputed survey by the ruling party said on Monday.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's party commissioned the opinion poll to run alongside Sunday's local elections, posing five policy questions to voters. His political opponents criticised the move as a gimmick and a way of trying to attract more supporters to the polling stations. The local election monitoring organisation OPORA questioned its methodology.

As an advisory vote, it has no legal weight per se, but Zelenskiy has promised to introduce legislative amendments, which he is entitled to do, to implement the views that emerge. According to the preliminary results published by Zelenskiy's party, nearly 90% of Ukrainians who took part in the poll supported the president's idea of ​​reducing the number of lawmakers, while 82% supported life sentences for corruption.

Some 46% supported the creation of a free economic zone in Donbass, while 46% were against. Oleksandr Kornienko, the chairman of Zelenskiy's party, said the issue "still requires discussion in society," but signalled his party would move ahead with trying to reduce the number of lawmakers.

The survey showed 64% supported the legalisation of cannabis. Another question related to raising international awareness about the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, under which Ukraine gave up its Soviet era nuclear arsenal in exchange for security guarantees about its territory. OPORA's head, Olha Aivazovska, told Reuters the survey was unrepresentative, saying "citizens could vote 10 times" if they wished. On Sunday afternoon, she had said the survey appeared to have been conducted at only 55% of polling stations.

Artem Gagarin, a TV presenter who coordinated the survey, said pollsters were not able to reach polling stations in certain areas but he played down the impact on the result.