Presidential election year brings maneuvering on referendum issues (01/17/99)

Presidential election year brings maneuvering on referendum issues

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - As politicians manuever for advantage in a presidential election year, in recent days calls for a national referendum on amendments to the Constitution have become more strident from across Ukraine's polarized political spectrum.

Both the left and the center-right have very different goals in going to the people to approve changes to Ukraine's fundamental law - efforts that to some degree are being spurred by the inability of the Verkhovna Rada to move on much major legislation due to the 50-50 ideological split in the body. However, both sides are trying to receive approval to implement plans they believe will make them more favorable in the eyes of the electorate in October when presidential elections are held.

The Communist Party has put forward the most dramatic proposal: to liquidate the office of the president and make Russian the second state language - two major items on the party's agenda since it achieved victory in the March 1998 parliamentary elections.

Meanwhile, President Leonid Kuchma has suggested that he may give the nod to a referendum to liquidate national deputies' immunity from criminal prosecution, a provision currently in Ukraine's Constitution.

During a political visit to Ternopil on January 10, Mr. Kuchma said the Verkhovna Rada has become a haven for those who now use the law to shelter themselves from responsibility for illegal actions and called for lifting parliamentary immunity.

The Procurator General's Office has said it has sufficient evidence to charge at least two current Ukrainian lawmakers, former Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko and Mykola Agafonov, a member of the Peasants' Party from Dnipropetrovsk, with financial improprieties, if their protection from prosecution is lifted. The Verkhovna Rada has yet to act on the matter.

The president also has tossed about the idea of extending his constitutional authority to make changes to economic laws by presidential decree for another five years, another issue that he indicated might be brought before the people in a national referendum.

The Ukrainian Constitution, approved in June 1996, gives the president such powers temporarily; they are to expire in June of this year if the nation's chief executive cannot win the approval of either the Verkhovna Rada or Ukraine's citizens to extend them.

The president first suggested that he may call a referendum to retain his constitutionally mandated authority when he spoke at a meeting of Ukraine's regional press in Kyiv in early December and reiterated it on January 10 in Ternopil.

According to President Kuchma, without this extraordinary authority, completing economic reforms will be impossible given the paralysis in the Verkhovna Rada and the resistance of a majority of national deputies toward movement to a free-market system.

Ukraine's Communist Party jumped on the referendum bandwagon on January 11, after hearing rumors that a public vote on changes to the Constitution was in the works.

Verkhovna Rada Vice-Chairman Adam Martyniuk, who is a member of the Communist faction, responded to reports that a petition-gathering campaign led by oblast leaders had begun for a popular referendum on the president's two proposals by stating that his party would demand that questions on abolishing the presidency and making Russian a second state language also be considered.

Mr. Martyniuk said the party's cadres had been instructed to attend any local meetings at which the issue of a referendum might be raised. "The Communists are prepared to assist the presidential structures in calling a nationwide referendum," said Mr. Martyniuk.

Verkhovna Rada Chairman Oleksander Tkachenko on January 12 attempted to quash any plans for a referendum organized by the executive branch. He said the executive branch, whether at the local or national level, does not hold the constitutional right to initiate a national referendum. That right, according to Mr. Tkachenko, belongs to "citizens of Ukraine, political parties, public organizations and work collectives."

"Irrespective of specifically what question on constitutional amendments is initiated by the executives of local bodies of government, such actions are inadmissible and shall be prevented," said Mr. Tkachenko.

On January 13 President Kuchma's press secretary, Oleksander Martynenko, denied that President Kuchma or his administration had anything to do with gathering petitions. "Neither the president nor the presidential administration have any connection to any massive actions for a referendum," said Mr. Martynenko.

The president's press secretary said he had information that the Rukh Party and the National Democratic Party had begun petition-gathering initiatives. "From what we understand, in Lviv more than 90,000 signatures have already been gathered," said Mr. Martynenko.

No one from the Rukh press office was available to comment on the party's role in organizing a referendum.

The NDP, while neither confirming nor denying that it is responsible for gathering signatures on a possible referendum, said the issue of deputies' immunity should be decided by the Parliament. An NDP leader, Volodymyr Filenko, explained that the general issue of immunity should be considered in parallel with the specific cases of Messrs. Lazarenko and Agafonov. "The Verkhovna Rada should decide this question on its own, without waiting for a referendum," said Mr. Filenko.

The Communist faction, meanwhile, had put together a draft bill on amendments and addenda to the Constitution providing for the cancellation of the presidency. On January 12 party leaders presented a motion that the Constitutional Court review the bill to confirm its legality. The motion was put to the Verkhovna Rada for a vote three times on January 12 and twice more the following day, each time failing to receive a majority of 226 votes.

Even with the fifth failure, Chairman Tkachenko said the Parliament would return to the motion and the bill on January 14.

The same day, President Kuchma's press secretary, Mr. Martynenko, took pains to inform reporters that the president does not support the bill. "I don't know if it needs to be said, but the president supports the institution of the office of the president," said Mr. Martynenko.

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