The elections of the President of Ukraine 2004 became a serious trial for maturity of the Ukrainian civil society that it has successfully surmounted. After the obvious election fraud the “orange revolution” broke   out that lasted for 17 days and brought millions of Ukrainian citizens to the streets for peaceful manifestations. Without a single drop of blood shed, the Orange revolution led to change of the existing regime in the country, established the rule of the legitimately elected President, fundamentally altered the existing image of Ukraine in the world.  The democratic breakthrough demonstrated the highly developed civic awareness of Ukrainian citizens and marked birth of the new political nation.

Vanguard and driving force of the Orange revolution in Ukraine was the civic campaign PORA that acted as independent of many political structures, commercial or state organizations, self-governing All-Ukrainian action aimed at ensuring the democratic elections of the President of Ukraine 2004.  From the announcement of the falsified results of the Presidential run-off PORA undertook the initiative and led the revolution to victor. PORA was the most hard-edged and active wing of Maidan. PORA set up the first tents on the central street of Kyiv Khrezhatyk and organized the famous tent city, blocked the administrative buildings, made the crucial contribution to organization of the all-Ukrainian student strike.

The large-scale and persistent work of PORA on informing and mobilizing the Ukrainian voters preceded the revolutionary events.  The civic campaign PORA started its activities at the beginning of 2004, following the initiative by the leaders of student movement of the early 90s. The events in Mukachevo in the spring of 2004, when PORA observed the local mayoral elections and performed the civic control over election process, were marked with braveness and selflessness of the PORA activists. This first experience, later enriched with the actions in Sumy, Odessa, Poltava, Donetsk, Kyiv and other cities enabled PORA to work out  the effective system of counteracting the elections fraud at the Presidential elections.

During the second half of the year 2004 activists of PORA conduced the national grass-root informational, educational and mobilization campaign within the electorate, using the technologies  from “hands to hands” and from “door to door”. Actually, in the conditions of absence of independent mass media PORA managed to create out of the volunteers delivering the true information about elections immediately to citizens all over Ukraine a kind of alternative mass media.  Furthermore, during the electoral campaign PORA constantly organized various bright actions and performances, rallies, concerts.

Impressive scale of campaign’s activities serves as an additional proof of its critical role in preparation and implementation of radical democratic changes in Ukraine in 2004.  Namely, from March 2004 till January 2005 PORA distributed 40 million copies of print products, involved in its work 35,000 permanent participants and an even larger number of supporters.  PORA activists conducted more than 750 regional pickets and public actions and organized 17 mass rallies with more than 3,000 participants.  PORA set up the tent camp on Khreschatyk (1,546 tents and more than 15,000 residents) and  12 tent camps in other cities of Ukraine.  Official campaign’s web site www.pora.org.ua was among five most popular web sites in Ukraine.

More detailed information about the activities of the civic campaign PORA can be found at the case study “PORA – Vanguard of Democracy” placed on our web-site. 

The civic campaign PORA was a special phenomenon in the Ukrainian society. Through its activities the actors of civil society in Ukraine for the first time were able to exert the tremendous influence on the political process in Ukraine, created preconditions for building of the new political nation on the basis of  the clearly defined priorities, ideas and approaches to future geopolitical and economical development of Ukraine.

After the Orange Revolution, in January 2005, the ceremony of the official completion of the activities of the civic campaign PORA took place. Within the year of its activity PORA became a genuine prototype of civil society that now gives birth to diverse civic organizations and political initiatives. PORA formed the democratic leaders who can contribute to Ukraine’s development on a number of levels:  support and promotional of the international democratic solidarity; development of the civil society in Ukraine; struggling against corruption; reforming of the system of personnel selection.

Therefore, after the official completion of its activities the campaign PORA followed the natural way of transformation into a range of the institutions of the civil society, among them:

­        All-Ukrainian non-governmental organization “Civic campaign PORA”;

­        All-Ukrainian non-governmental organization “New PORA”;

­        All-Ukrainian youth public organization “Young PORA”;

­        All-Ukrainian non-governmental organization “Green PORA”;

­        International Democracy Institute;

­        Civic party PORA.

The constituent assembly of the civic party PORA took place in Kyiv, on January 12, 2005. Notwithstanding the pressure from the Ministry of Justice, PORA won the court process and on August 1, 2005 obtained the registration certificate with the right to participate in the elections to the Parliament and local councils in 2006.  The highest governing body of the civic party PORA is Civic Convention. In the period between the Civic Conventions the highest governing organs are  Central Council of the Party and Political Council. Vladyslav Kaskiv is currently the Chairman of the Political Council. 

The civic party PORA became a new force on the political scene of Ukraine that was to replace the existing politicians.  The party draws the talented young professionals, which didn’t see for themselves viable conditions for acting within existing political parties and structures, into the realm of politics and administration. Civic party PORA became an answer of the new generations of Ukrainians to the challenges in the form of corruption, criminalization and usurpation of power.

In its activities PORA is strictly adherent to the civic values and ideals that should become the basis of the new Ukraine, in particular the ideals of Freedom, Democracy, Unity, Legitimacy, Europeanism and Civic Dignity. These civic values were proclaimed in the Charter of Maidan Values adopted at Maidan Nezalezhnosty (Independence Square) on August 22, 2005.

During  the year 2005 PORA repeatedly addressed the Ukrainian authorities with a range of practical proposals. Namely, in September 2005 PORA announced its “Anticrisis Action Plan” aimed at bringing the fundamental change to the decision-making system on the state level, ensuring the unity of the power branches, improving the mechanisms within the public policy and administration.

In December PORA submitted for consideration in the Parliament of Ukraine the legislative “Development package” that envisaged the step-to-step implementation of the radical system reforms in the administrative, legal, economic, social, cultural and educational spheres and in the sphere of local  self-government. The Ukrainian society already for the long time feels the need on such reforms.

Additionally the civic party PORA carries out a series of the large-scale projects and actions, among them Black lists, protection of small business, campaign on collection of signatures against the recently introduced immunity of the deputies of local councils, campaign “It’s time to ask them”, etc.

The civic party PORA will participate in the elections to the National Parliament and local councils in March 2006. PORA will run for the Parliament within the Civic Coalition “PORA – ROP” that includes the civic party PORA and Reforms and Order party. The electoral list of the coalition was ratified at the I interparty  Congress on December 19, 2005. On the top of the list there is a world famous heavyweight boxer Vitaliy Klychko.