Roman Zvarych, former New Yorker, now Ukrainian parliamentarian (05/24/98)

Roman Zvarych, former New Yorker, now Ukrainian parliamentarian

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Elected on March 29, Roman Zvarych became the first member of the Ukrainian Parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, to have been born in the U.S. Earlier he had scored another first when he became the first American citizen to take Ukrainian citizenship, which he did in 1995.

Mr. Zvarych, 45, whose parents were born in Ukraine but were forced to move to the West during World War II, was born in Yonkers, New York, in 1953, and lived in the New York area until 1990, when he moved to Ukraine. He renounced his U.S. citizenship in 1993.

Mr. Zvarych, who has a Ph.D. in philosophy, taught at Columbia University and was an active member of Ukrainian Liberation Front organizations while he lived in New York. In Ukraine he headed the Center for Democratic Reform before being elected a national deputy. Roman Woronowycz conducted this interview with Mr. Zvarych the week of May 17.

Q: First of all, tell us how it feels to be the first Ukrainian national deputy who was born in the United States.

A: I was the first American citizen to renounce U.S. citizenship in favor of Ukrainian. Now there are two of us, myself and Ivan Lozowy. We are now not only both citizens of Ukraine, but members of Rukh.

The feeling [of being a national deputy] is not all that strange because I spent a lot of time in these very corridors prior to becoming deputy, so I kind of know this kitchen from the inside. I was long accustomed to the rather raucous atmosphere of this Parliament.

To be quite frank, we already have so much work to do that I have not spent very much time thinking about the fact that at one point I was an American citizen.

I think I have gotten involved already in the mundane day-to-day work of a national deputy of Ukraine. There are quite a lot of questions that are constantly hanging over your head. All these problems need to be resolved, so one never really have time to think about one's specific personal decisions while this strange political game is being played out in the Verkhovna Rada.

Q: What kind of problems did you have to confront as a former U.S. citizen running for a seat to the Verkhovna Rada?

A: First of all, I was elected a national deputy from my party's list. I did not run in a single-mandate district in these elections. But I ran in two separate elections prior to the March 1998 elections, for a single-mandate seat here in the capital. In both elections I took approximately 70 percent of the vote, but I was not elected because of the very specific nuances of the old electoral law, which required that at least 50 percent of the registered electorate in a given district vote. In both instances we managed to get about 48 to 49 percent of the electorate to vote, but we couldn't cross the threshold, although I had 70 percent support in my district among those who voted.

Initially, when I was running in that single-mandate district it was very difficult. I think that I was starting from a minus position precisely because of my American background. Many people, of course, looked at my former American citizenship with a certain degree of suspicion. So it took me quite a long time and required a lot of effort on my part to convince my voters that precisely because of my former American citizenship perhaps I am in a better position to judge what it is that democracy is made of, what kind of market reforms need to be implemented, basically what it is that needs to be done in this country in order to rationally reach some kind of more effective system of government.

Objectively speaking, I think I was successful simply because I was able to obtain as many votes as I did. Prior to running for office, since I've been here for six years at this point, I have always been involved with the political life of this country.

In 1995 I became a member of Narodnyi Rukh Ukrainy. At the December 1995 assembly, or convention, I was elected to the central leadership, the executive board, if you will, of my party. My party took a decision at that point to run my candidacy for Parliament as a strategic candidate, which I did.

And subsequently once these elections got rolling, for some time I was also the national campaign manager for Rukh, which required that I not run for a single-mandate seat, but run strictly on my party's list, which is what happened. I had a sufficiently high position on my party's list to be able to be speak of a guaranteed position, although I expected Rukh to do better than we did.

I was number 24, but we managed to push 38 or 39 of our candidates from the list itself. Of course many people who were higher up on the list were running in rather secure, single-mandate districts, so in effect I was 16 or so on the list, which allowed me to run a campaign on a nationwide basis. I spent a lot of time in western Ukraine, either campaigning for specific candidates, or for the party itself.

Q: When did you renounce U.S. citizenship and became a Ukrainian citizen and why?

A: On October 2, 1993, I formally renounced American citizenship and then waited for 17 months. It was on that day that I actually forwarded what I guess is to be called an appeal to the president [of Ukraine] asking to be granted Ukrainian citizenship. It was a nearly 17-month procedure during which I needed to put together an entire little mountain of documents that the law required.

Then on January 16, 1995, according to a special decree that was issued by the president, I was granted citizenship.

Q: Was it a difficult decision, and again, why did you decide to do it?

A: The answer to both questions is the same. Why, and was it difficult, are kind of part of the same package. I was always very involved in politics, even when I was living in th United States, and I wanted to be a politician. But I never really saw my place in American politics. I was more involved in Ukrainian diaspora politics.

So when Ukraine declared independence, it was almost a natural decision. In fact I can't even say that it was a decision on my part, a conscious decision to move here and renounce American citizenship. It was just the natural thing to do.

Of course, one thing led to another. Since I was so involved in politics it was natural that I take my place, or attempt to take my place, in the highest legislative body of this country, hoping to be able to add something, to implement some of the programs that I think are needed to be implemented in this country.

Q: What are the benefits of having accepted Ukrainian citizenship?

A: I can live with myself. I think that is foremost. I don't want to criticize any of my once, or former, friends back in the States. I have kind of broken ties with all of my former friends. Everything I am about to say is strictly personal, this is my own personal feeling. I would think that it would be very difficult to consider yourself a Ukrainian - not a Ukrainian American but a Ukrainian - and not take advantage of the opportunity to become a citizen of Ukraine. For me anyway it would be an internal contradiction that would lead to various psychological problems.

So, in order to alleviate any possible problems, psychologically and otherwise, this was the right thing for me to do.

Like I say it was not a moral decision, or a political decision, it was almost a result of a natural course of events, both objective and subjective, that had taken place in my life prior to Ukraine's independence.

Q: So was it difficult?

A: Not at all. It was so easy I can't remember the date that I made that decision. It was something that naturally occurred.

Q: Going back to the Verkhovna Rada, of which you are now a member, what are the biggest problems before it?

A: At this particular stage I think that the primary problem is electing a chairman and two deputies. We now have a Parliament that is much more structured that the Parliaments of the past precisely because in this Parliament the deputies were elected according to a new electoral law, as you know, which places greater emphasis on the role of the parties.

We now have eight factions in the Parliament, each of which represents a specific party, and it's now easier to structure the Parliament. On the other hand, however, we haven't gotten to the stage where we can speak of a genuine parliamentary majority. In other words, what we are now involved in is a very complex process of maneuvering; all sorts of very strange shows of strengths.

Politics now beginning to make for very strange bedfellows, when you see people from very different sides of the ideological spectrum joining forces specifically on this one issue, in other words who is going to be chairman. And no one yet has a guaranteed majority in order to be able to push through their candidate or their package of candidates, speaking of the speaker and the two deputies.

Q: Where do you think the priority should be among the other important issues that stand before this Parliament, for instance administrative reform, the credit problem, tax reform?

A: I think the primary problem that we will address very early is the financial crisis and the underlying economic crisis. You had mentioned already a few specific pieces of legislation that I think need to be passed immediately, specifically something along the lines of a new, more streamlined tax code.

We don't really have a tax code now, we have a package of legislation, much of which is contradictory, that needs to be overhauled completely. This is one of the major roadblocks to economic reform.

A second problem that I think needs to be addressed is legislation, or a package of legislation, that in the West would be called commercial or business law. I would begin with legislation regulating the banking system, specifically the credit system in this country.

We have a system now where the commercial banks, and there are quite a few, act as affiliates of the national bank, and that's a very odd situation to find oneself in a country that has declared its intentions to move towards a market economy.

Certainly, much work needs to be done in the legal sphere, where I want to work in a legal committee, specifically in administrative reforms, the law on the Cabinet of Ministers, law on political parties, a new civil code and for that matter a new judicial system.

The legislation that we now have on the books on the judicial system is not in accordance with the newly passed Constitution, which calls for an independent judiciary. Our judiciary is still to a large extent dependent on the executive branch of government and I think that needs to be changed radically.

So these are the areas in which we need to work effectively and quickly.

Q: A final question. I noticed while watching you today and yesterday that you seem to have a specific role on the parliamentary floor. You have asked some interesting and provocative questions of the speakers. Have you and Rukh decided that you will play the role of an agitator on the floor, or is it something within your character?

A: It's kind of a mixture of both. We have a faction that now comprises 50 deputies, and not everyone of them has the chutzpah to get up in front of 450 people and tell them what they really think, and to be able to do that in the form of what should be an objective, unpretentious question. I think my party has realized that I have a certain talent here. I kind of have been chosen as one of the trigger men that we have in our faction.

Q: It also leaves you wide open because of your past American citizenship.

A: I know that. But we've made a conscious decision as to who will be some of the more high-profile deputies in this Parliament, at least at this particular stage. In some areas I happen to be one of those deputies that should establish a high profile so as to be able to use that high profile later on, especially when it comes to breaking up into various committees and taking charge of various committees.

It's also a matter of sheer luck. The way you get a chance to say anything in front of this Parliament is basically a kind of roulette game; however the computer spits out your name. Apparently this computer has so far been very kind to me.