Ukraine's president-elect Viktor Yushchenko claims that reforms can benefit each of the country's 48 million people within a year as it moves towards becoming eastern Europe's most modern economy.
Yushchenko looks poised to take power after a re-run of a fraudulent poll on December 26th handed him an eight-point lead, but his opponent, former prime minister Viktor Yanukovich, has refused to concede defeat, and is pursuing legal challenges.
Analysts say the government Yushchenko appoints must move fast to deal with high inflation and a gaping budget deficit, and reform the country's Soviet-era heavy industry, dominated by wealthy and influential "oligarchs".
Speaking to Polish journalists in a meeting broadcast by private channel TVN 24, Yushchenko said he would introduce a fast-acting package of social policies and job creation.
"I am convinced that Ukraine is still sleeping to the east of Europe, but I am also convinced that it will become the most modern market in eastern Europe," Yushchenko said.
"I will prove one thing: if this country is governed by honest people, who love their country and their people, and this government can survive, then within 365 days each person will feel the effects of the economic development plan," he said.
Since it gained independence in the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union, Ukraine has struggled to rein in corruption and tame its bureaucracy, earning ratings as one of the world's most corrupt states from anti-graft group Transparency International.
Yushchenko's supporters want Ukraine to follow the path of reform trod by western neighbours like Poland and Slovakia, which joined the European Union last year.
Yushchenko, a former central banker, was widely praised by Western investors and international financial institutions for economic reforms he implemented as prime minister in 2000 and 2001.
- PA
