INTERVIEW: Rukh leader Chornovil on upcoming presidential election
by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau
KYIV - Vyacheslav Chornovil is the leader of the Rukh Party and head of its faction in the Verkhovna Rada. He has been a national deputy since 1990 and twice an unsuccessful presidential candidate. He also is a co-founder of Rukh, the Popular Movement of Ukraine, which was the driving force in the social processes that led to the independence of Ukraine and the precursor to the party that Mr. Chornovil currently heads. During the Soviet era he was a leading Ukrainian human rights activist and served time in Soviet prison camps. Today he is a primary voice of democracy and one of the chief antagonists of the left. The following edited interview, published in two parts, is translated from Ukrainian.
CONCLUSION
Q: Now about the upcoming elections. Rukh, the Reform and Order Party, and the Republican Christian Party have united and are supporting Hennadii Udovenko for president. All the same, none of these parties can say that they are strong in the populous east. What do you still need to do to properly prepare for the elections?
A: Let's look at who is strong in the east: the Communists. We passed the 4 percent threshhold in 20 oblasts of Ukraine. We failed to get 4 percent in Donetsk, Luhansk, Sumy, Kharkiv, Zaporizhia.
If you negate all the votes we received in western Ukraine, we still passed the 4 percent threshhold of votes in the rest of Ukraine. We, and the Communists, are probably the only two parties who did that.
Q: But 4 percent won't do in the presidential elections.
A: Don't forget that some of our votes were stolen. And you can't make an analogy between presidential and parliamentary elections. In the latter there were 30 parties and blocs.
Now, don't forget that you need a million signatures, with 30,000 from each of 18 oblasts. Some leading newspapers are saying that there will be only two candidates, Kuchma and the Communists.
However, I believe that we also will get 1 million signatures. It will be difficult. Earlier (for Parliament elections) we gathered 700,000, but turned in 650,000. Then there was no barrier of 30,000. I think that it was only 10,000.
We could easily gather the needed amount by simply going door to door in Halychyna for a single candidate, but now that won't do.
If the law is not changed, there will be many fewer candidates, but a veto could still occur. If they don't change the law there will probably be five candidates. It is not a simple task; much effort will be needed.
Q: Who might the candidates be?
A: I can tell you that from the organized structures it may only be us and the Communists. But the president holds power and with that power they may be able to do something. The National Democratic Party does not have the organization that we and the Communists do. But they do have access to power, so they may be able to do something.
Beyond that, only money will work.
Q: What about Yevhen Marchuk?
A: He is currently looking for support. He has taken the leadership of some sort of automobile club, some sort of international economic organization. He is hurriedly looking for a structure to support him. But these are structures bereft of people, they are a different sort of species.
If he finds the money ... he has the newspaper Den, which receives about $200,000 monthly, so he has gathered some money.
Q: And Lazarenko?
A: Lazarenko could be [a contender]. [Hromada] was the first to register [in the Parliament elections]. They bought themselves an organization.
But right now Lazarenko is under such attack that even if he buys the 1 million [signatures] - and he will not be able to find them otherwise - he will receive less during the actual elections.
He has discredited himself, and I would not suggest that he run, right now.
Q: What do you think of the new political union called Zlahoda?
A: It substitutes for the NDP and New Ukraine. It was established for the president - even if they don't loudly pronounce it as such - for the president and the elections.
We didn't join, not even as observers.
Q: Then why was Ivan Drach present?
A: Drach was there as the leader of the World Coordinating Council of Ukrainians, or maybe the Ukraina Society. It was by invitation. I also was invited. These were personal invitations.
Q: Will the coalition of Rukh, Reform and Order, and Republican Christians be able to find a common language with Zlahoda?
A: Sure, we will be able to - but not in a single organization or candidate. Kuchma is not our candidate. We have our own.
Q: But Prime Minister Valerii Pustovoitenko, who heads Zlahoda, said that it had not yet settled on a candidate for president.
A: Mr. Pustovoitenko can say what he wants, but he is going to work for the re-election of Kuchma.
The NDP in reality has various camps. There are those who don't want Kuchma. Others are still uncertain. And there are those who will strongly support him. These are the three viewpoints.
Maybe Pustovoitenko has his own individual interests in mind. The new parliamentary session will soon begin, and a threat still exists that his government may be asked to resign. He may have gathered these political powers together so that they don't vote in the Parliament to dismiss the government.
Q: What are the realistic chances for victory by President Kuchma? What are the chances of Oleksander Moroz, who is also considered a favorite, and, finally, of your candidate, Hennadii Udovenko?
A: With regard to the president, I would say 50-50. From one point of view, there is the difficult economic situation, the dissatisfaction of many people. From another point of view, there is the possibility of influencing people via the administrative apparatus. Our people still have not been spoiled by democracy.
He has the finances to throw money to the city administrative structures before the elections. There is also the possibility, if we are not able to get the people to vote for our candidate, that a certain portion of the centrists may support Kuchma because they are scared of the Communists, as we are.
So he has a chance, but not to the extent that you think, that because he is running he will automatically win. Anything can happen, as it did with [former President Leonid] Kravchuk. When the economic situation is worse, the chances of the incumbent president are worse.
As for Moroz, if he is the single candidate of the left, he could have a chance of winning. If [Communist Party leader Petro] Symonenko, [Progressive Socialist Natalia] Vitrenko and maybe even [Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Oleksander] Tkachenko run, then he has no chance for victory. Even if he gains the support of the Communists, there will have to be a run-off.
His is not a certain electorate. In the last presidential elections the left had a single candidate in Moroz. What did he take, third place? Some 12 percent of the vote.
But Moroz on his own has the ability to portray himself as not of the hard-line left, so if the left presented him as its sole candidate he would stand a chance, a good chance. But that is not a realistic possibility any longer. The left has split too much.
Udovenko has a chance if all the centrists can unite. Right now we do not have everybody. It is not enough. We are continuing our work.
There are some concerns about his age. But we have a formula for success that is being developed. Let me show you a commentary that I am developing for our newspaper. Here is the title: "Formula for success: The trustworthy political patriarch and his young team of reformers."
The person is absolutely trustworthy. His commitment to statehood is beyond reproach. He has no connections to clans and no debts to them. Kuchma has political debts he owes and for that reason he also has had a tough time with reforms. From one side there is Volkov, from another side somebody else.
You understand yourself that those who brought Kuchma to power demanded dividends. But Udovenko has no such debts, we are organizing his effort. He does not have this negative aspect.
If we can unite and convince people that when the old guard begins putting pressure on him, he will be able to reject them and rely on his young team of reformers, then we will have a chance.
Q: Isn't another one of his limitations that he has spent the last years outside of Ukraine, and in the months since he returned from abroad he has been rather quiet.
A: Yes, but he is a known name. We do not have the abilities through the mass media, such as Kuchma does or even Moroz. Or the Communists, who have an electorate in the east larger than ours. However, he is not an unknown name.
A possible candidate was Yurii Kostenko. We did a survey in Kharkiv and some other city of a few hundred people, simply a question on whether they were familiar with such a person.
We asked about Chornovil as well. Everybody knows Chornovil, some look at him negatively, some positively, but everybody knows him.
Udovenko, basically, is also familiar to everybody. Maybe a few people did not know who he is. Nobody knew Yurii Kostenko. We also asked about a few others.
This is good. Now we want to let them know that it will be a whole new team. The chances exist. How we will take advantage of that is to be seen.
It is important that we find unity. Some on the right want Marchuk. A portion of the center supports Kuchma because they are afraid of the left. So it will not be easy.
Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, February 21, 1999, No. 8, Vol. LXVII
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