Eastern Ukraine: the DIY referendum

Outside a large  secondary school Jara the labrador has been prepped for the referendum – wrapped up in the flag of the self-declared People’s Republic of Donetsk (PRD).

Inside, up comes a beaming teenager, Union Jack T- shirt with “Keep Improving” as slogan, passport with new home-made cover in the colours of the PRD.

At some polling stations in schools there are long queues. At least one headteacher refused to allow her school to be used for polling and received predictable threats as a result.

In the polling stations we visited there were no sons of any armed men, just a genuinely relaxed atmosphere. At one city centre polling station two armed men strode in, vaguely stopped anyone filming for a while and then left. Their mission was unclear to me and looked unclear even to them.

It’s a really home-made referendum. At some polling stations you make your yes/no on a trestle table overlooked by anyone around. You then post it into a clear perspex ballot box where you can see the “yes” votes pile up.

Elsewhere ballot boxes might not be see-through but they but will be in the PRD colours. Just as they said, it is a poll controlled by the separatists and for the separatists.

Which leaves the big question out there –  what of the “nos”? How big is the stay-at-home “no” vote and how intimidated does it feel?

How many are at home in fear, for every yes voter out there saying – as they do – that they are striking a blow against “the fascists of Kiev”?

For what it’s worth the opinion polls indicate they are large in number but, today, all but silent in voice.

After several hours peering into perspex ballot boxes at various locations we had seen precisely two “no” votes by morning in Donetsk.