THE DIASPORA NEEDS TO WAKE UP TO THE THREAT OF A YANUKOVYCH VICTORY IN THE 2010 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS
The Ukrainian-Canadian and Ukrainian-American diasporas have yet to appreciate that the upcoming 17 January 2010 presidential elections will be a replay of the 2004 elections. Five years ago Viktor Yushchenko faced Viktor Yanukovych in the dirtiest and bitterest election in Ukraine’s history. In six months Yulia Tymoshenko will face the same Yanukovych in what will become another battle of wills between two different world views, European and Eurasian.
As with all Ukrainian presidential elections, there will be many other presidential candidates but this should not distract us from the fact that the main contest – as in 2004 – will be between the two main candidates. This time round that has to be Tymoshenko and Yanukovych.
Viktor Yushchenko has 3% support and cannot expect to win a large number of votes because Ukrainians do not believe he has fulfilled his election promises. Bandits never went to jail – they instead received state medals and high ranking state positions.
Anatoliy Hrytsenko’s ratings have remained static at 1-2%.
Arseniy Yatseniuk after being removed as parliamentary speaker last November rapidly gained popularity because of public disillusionment with quarrelling Ukrainian politicians. More importantly, Yatseniuk gained popularity from free air time on Ukraine’s most popular television channel Inter, courtesy of gas intermediary RosUkrEnergo co-owner Dmytro Firtash and first deputy Security Service chairman Valeriy Khoroshkovsky. Yatseniuk’s campaign has increasingly become pro-Russian in its orientation, especially following its take-over by Russian political consultants in June 2009. Kyiv Mohyla Academy Professor Rostyslav Pawlenko, who headed a group of Ukrainian consultants in the Yatseniuk campaign, was removed that month.
Yatseniuk’s election campaign will be undermined by Yushchenko as he will take away votes, thereby automatically ensuring Tymoshenko’s entry into the second round. The voters who backed Our Ukraine in the 2006 and 2007 elections are being courted by four candidates – Yushchenko, Hrytsenko, Yatseniuk, and extreme right Oleh Tyahnybok.
It is understandable that the Ukrainian-Canadian and Ukrainian-American diaspora’s are disillusioned over politics and politicians in Ukraine. That is also true with Ukrainians themselves who are also quite disillusioned.
Nevertheless, disillusionment and soul searching in the Ukrainian Canadian and Ukrainian American diaspora’s needs to take a second place to the reality of ten threats that a Yanukovych election victory represents:
1. Little Russia: Yanukovych has no Ukrainian ethno-cultural awareness and sees Ukraine as firmly ensconced in the Russian sphere of influence. Yanukovych, Dmytro Tabachnyk and other Party of Regions leaders have strongly condemned the alleged “nationalist” bias in Ukrainian history and would seek to change the manner in which Ukrainian history would be taught. The Party of Regions, together with the Communist Party, voted against legislation on the Ukrainian famine. There would be no possibility of the official recognition of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army under a Yanukovych presidency.
2. Russian as a second state language: this programme was included in the Party of Regions programme for the 2006 and 2007 parliamentary elections.
3. Oligarchs: a Yanukovych election victory would mean the take-over of Ukraine by the Donetsk criminal mafia. Donetsk oligarch Renat Akhmetov has a $31 billion wealth, according to Korrespondent magazine, making him the wealthiest person in Eurasia and Europe.
4. Russian Orthodox Church: Increase the spiritual occupation of Ukraine by the Moscow Patriarch. Yanukovych accompanied Patriarch Kyryl everywhere in Ukraine during his August 2009 visit.
5. Crimea: increase the range of powers given to the Crimean autonomous republic that could increase support for separatists. The Party of Regions initiated the successful Crimean vote in September 2008 to recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states.
6. Black Sea Fleet: the Party of Regions has always supported Russia’s plans to seek an indefinite extension of the basing agreement for the Russian Black Sea Fleet beyond 2017.
7. Single Economic Space: Yanukovych told the 2008 congress of the Unified Russia Party led by Vladimir Putin that he would support Ukraine’s membership of the CIS Single Economic Space. The Single Economic Space of the CIS was signed by President Leonid Kuchma and Prime Minister Yanukovych in 2003.
8. NATO: Prime Minister Yanukovych told NATO in September 2008 that Ukraine did not need a Membership Action Plan (MAP). A MAP is considered the preparatory stage for eventual membership of NATO.
9. European Union (EU): the Party of Regions has never expressed any interest in implementing the Copenhagen Criteria required to join the EU. The Party of Regions is the only large party in the Ukrainian parliament which has never expressed an interest in affiliation with a Political Group in the European Parliament. Fatherland, Our Ukraine and the Socialist Party are members of the European People’s Party and the Socialist International respectively.
10. World Congress of Ukrainians: the Party of Regions has never expressed any interest in contact to, and cooperation with, the World Congress of Ukrainians. Since 2002, during the last four elections the Party of Regions and Yanukovych have revived Soviet-era attacks against “nationalism” in Western Ukraine and the Ukrainian diaspora.
Overriding all other considerations should be our determination to not permit the election of Yanukovych in the January 2010 presidential elections that will be primarily a contest between Tymoshenko and Yanukovych. Of the candidates who have emerged from the former “orange” camp, only Tymoshenko has the ability, charisma, determination and experience to defeat Yanukovych.
Taras Kuzio, Ph.D.
Senior Fellow, Chair of Ukrainian Studies, University of Toronto, Adjunct Research Professor, Carleton University, Editor, Ukraine Analyst
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