Ukraine will choose again tomorrow between the western-friendly orange partners and the eastern-facing alternative, writes Daniel McLaughlinin Odessa.
Olga Sevastionova wishes the Orange Revolution had never happened, and millions of her fellow Ukrainians share the feeling. "I never believed in it, because it was clearly planned and paid for by the United States," says Sevastionova, a museum guide in the Black Sea port of Odessa.
"Now its leaders are making trouble for us with Russia, our brothers by blood and culture, and having done nothing for this country they still expect us to vote for them again."
In tomorrow's general election, Ukrainians will either give the "orange" team another chance to reform Europe's second largest country, or punish them for their squabbles and incompetence and hand power to the man they thought they had vanquished back in 2004.
Then, huge street protests against the fraudulent presidential election "victory" of Viktor Yanukovich forced a rerun of the poll in which Viktor Yushchenko triumphed, supported by the woman whom he soon made his prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko.
The Orange Revolution was welcomed in western capitals, which believed it would propel Ukraine towards the European Union and Nato and away from Russia, the huge neighbour with which it shares centuries of intertwined history.
It was also celebrated in western Ukraine, a traditionally nationalist stronghold bordering EU members Poland, Romania, Hungary and Slovakia, which has long resented the powerful influence that Moscow exerts on the south and east of the country.
In the east, Russian is the main language and billionaires with close ties to Moscow own the coal mines, steel mills and factories of Ukraine's industrial engine room; in the south, most of the Black Sea coast acquired by tsarina Catherine the Great still sees itself as Russian, not Ukrainian.
In cities such as Odessa, Yanukovich's defeat in the Orange Revolution was widely seen as part of a western-backed conspiracy to expand the EU and Nato and shrink Russia's sphere of influence - and most of the region's voters are poised to again back their man against his old foes.
"I'll vote for Yanukovich's party, and most people around here will do the same," says Sevastionova. "They are not perfect, but I like their idea of being closer to Russia."
In the final days of a hard-fought campaign, no punches were pulled by any of the main players: Yushchenko's Our Ukraine party, Bloc Yulia led by Tymoshenko, and Yanukovich's Party of Regions.
AT THE TOPof Odessa's famed Potemkin Stairs, two young volunteers dressed in the blue of the Party of Regions handed out leaflets that tells locals: "We won't surrender Odessa!" "Our only weapon against the orange chaos is the ballot! Use it - come and vote on September 30th. Your unused ballot will be like a bullet in your back later on!" The vehement imprecation to vote may suggest that there is some truth behind claims from Tymoshenko's team that she is gaining support in Yanukovich's traditional southern and eastern stronghold and capitalising on a "blue wave of disappointment" with his policies.
"Let them worry about their own support," says Boris Kolesnikov, campaign manager for Yanukovich. "When Yushchenko became president he won more than 50 per cent of support, now his party is unlikely to get 12 per cent. All the so-called achievements of the Orange Revolution have collapsed. Their rule was chaos, but when Yanukovich became prime minister [in August 2006] we got things back on track."
Just a few months after sweeping to power, the orange alliance descended into bitter in-fighting that led to Yushchenko sacking Tymoshenko and, following months of political paralysis, finally accepting the ignominy of replacing her with a resurgent Yanukovich.
Their tense relationship collapsed this summer when the president accused his premier of trying to illegally "poach" members of parliament from other parties in the hope of establishing an absolute majority with which he could oust and impeach the president and change the constitution.
A stand-off lasting several weeks resulted in Yanukovich reluctantly agreeing to Sunday's elections, from which his party is expected to emerge as the largest in parliament - but perhaps with fewer seats than a patched-up alliance between Yushchenko and Tymoshenko.
"All the forces of democracy, including those that stood shoulder to shoulder on Independence Square [in 2004] have drawn serious conclusions from our most recent history," Yushchenko said this week in a carefully stage-managed television appearance with Tymoshenko, which began with him warmly kissing her hand.
"[The task] we are faced with today is to send a clear signal to the people that the democrats are ready to act together and to implement national priorities together," the president said. "We have only one option and that is forming a democratic coalition."
His comments seemed intended to end speculation that he might form an alliance with Yanukovich, and may have been motivated in part by opinion polls that suggest that the leaders of the Orange Revolution could win an overall parliamentary majority if they work together.
"The situation we had was that of political decisions that made a couple almost enemies," Hryhoriy Nemyria, a close aide to Yulia Tymoshenko, says of the former prime minister's relationship with the president. "Now it is not quite a remarriage but something like a divorced couple who consider each other friends, and want to take care of their shared project. We will make every effort to form a coalition [with Yushchenko's party]. And no matter what the results we will propose a 50/50 split of cabinet posts between the two parties, with Yulia becoming prime minister, which she deserves."
The offer seems to have won over Yushchenko and his party, which surveys predict may only take about 12 per cent of votes, against 25 per cent for Bloc Yulia and 34 per cent for the Party of Regions; he may also have his eye on presidential elections planned for 2009, in which he would almost certainly face a stiff challenge from Tymoshenko should they fail to unite now.
RECALLING TYMOSHENKO'S VOLATILEseven-month tenure as prime minister in 2005, which was dogged by political in-fighting and rows over whether to reverse dubious privatisations of a decade ago, the Party of Regions says a renewed "orange alliance" would be a disaster for Ukraine.
"The West has over-rated Bloc Yulia," Kolesnikov believes. "It has a purely populist ideology, is almost ultra-left, and would lead the country in a dangerous direction . . . exacerbating the sharp split between the west [of Ukraine] and the south and east. The ideas of Bloc Yulia have nothing in common with the concerns of democrats or western values."
The Party of Regions says Tymoshenko's party is wooing voters with promises that would cripple Ukraine, including pledges to raise wages and pensions, to compensate millions of people who lost money in a banking collapse, and to investigate murky privatisation deals that benefited many of Yanukovich's wealthiest allies in the industrial east.
"The main achievement of the so-called Orange Revolution was to increase freedom of speech in Ukraine. All the rest was about securing power over politics and the economy, and revenge and repression against politicians from eastern Ukraine," says Kolesnikov, one of the country's richest businessmen, who spent several months in jail in 2005 while being investigated for alleged racketeering.
In western Ukraine, moves against the eastern "oligarchs" are usually cheered to the skies, and Tymoshenko attacked such people and their links to Yanukovich last week in the city of Lviv, near Ukraine's border with Poland.
"It's shameful that half the population in this educated country looks back fondly at communism and now prays to Yanukovich to solve all their problems," says Ivan Bolesta (57), a professor at Lviv University.
Vitaly (30), who travels 45km from his village to work in a Lviv bookmaker for €250 a month, clutched a little Bloc Yulia flag, but says he didn't have the enthusiasm to wave it. "She is probably the best we have, but they all promise the earth and deliver nothing. On Sunday we have another election, and on Monday everything will be the same - still high prices and rubbish wages and pensions."
That joint disillusionment is perhaps what unites Ukraine's east and west most strongly.
"We've had enough of politics and elections. Yushchenko, Tymoshenko and Yanukovich keep swapping places, but nothing gets better," says Anatoly (30), who works on the Odessa docks.
"It seems we have to choose the least bad of three evils," adds his wife, Svetlana. "But I've no idea who that would be."
The choices: main parties and leaders
Prime minister Viktor Yanukovich (57)
Party of Regions (PRU)
• Generally sympathetic to Russia
• Known for increasing state regulation of economy and social spending
Yulia Tymoshenko (47)
Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc (BYT)
• Was fired as prime minister in 2005 after seven months in office
• Pro-western
President Viktor Yuschenko (53)
Our Ukraine: People's Self-Defence
• Party is led by Yuri Lutsenko, and backs President Viktor Yuschenko
• Closer ties with the European Union and Nato.