The UOC-MP, prior to 2019, was believed to be the largest religious body in Ukraine with the greatest number of parish churches and communities counting up to half of the total in Ukraine and totaling over 10,000. The UOC also claimed to have up to 75 percent of the Ukrainian population. Independent surveys showed significant variance. According to Stratfor, in 2008, more than 50 percent of Ukrainian population belonged to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church under the Moscow Patriarch. Razumkov Centre survey results, however, tended to show greater adherence to the rival Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyivan Patriarchate. Many Orthodox Ukrainians do not clearly identify with a particular Orthodox jurisdiction and, sometimes, are even unaware of the affiliation of the parish they attend as well as of the controversy itself, which indicates the difficulty of using survey numbers as an indicator of a relative strength of the church. Additionally, the geographical factor plays a major role in the number of adherents, as the Ukrainian population tends to be more churchgoing in the western part of the country rather than in the UOC-MP's heartland in southern and eastern Ukraine. Politically, many in Ukraine see the UOC-MP as merely a puppet of the ROC and consequently a geopolitical tool of Russia, which have stridently opposed the consolidation and recognition of the independent OCU.