FACES AND PLACES: Connecting the dots: Ukraine's parliamentary elections (03/17/02)

FACES AND PLACES

by Myron B. Kuropas

Connecting the dots: Ukraine's parliamentary elections

With Ukraine's parliamentary elections less than two weeks away, allow me to attempt to connect some dots.

As of right now, the election is too close to call. How about that for waffling?

It's true, however. Time Europe reports that, according to an opinion poll conducted in mid-February by the Liberty Fund, "the unreformed Communist Party currently leads with 19 percent of the potential voters. Yuschenko's Our Ukraine is second with 17.4 percent, while the pro-presidential Social Democratic Party of Ukraine has 6.7 percent. The vote is highly fragmented, as 35 blocs and parties are standing in the election."

According to Vitaly Sych of the Kyiv Post, many pundits believed that the Communist Party's strong showing in the 1994 parliamentary elections was a temporary phenomenon. Analysts were convinced that the Communist Party's supporters were mostly old people, nostalgic for Soviet times. As they died off, so would communism. This didn't happen.

Valery Mishura, Communist Party ideologue, now claims that the party has reoccupied all of the regional city and district party offices it commanded prior to its being officially banned between 1991 and 1993. Part of its present allure, no doubt, is the fact that Communists now support private business (many of them have become rich after the fall of the USSR, so why wouldn't they?) freedom of worship, and a multi-party Ukraine.

The Social Democratic Party (United) is a different story. According to a recent issue of The Ukraine Insider, SDPU "is not a political party at all in the Western sense but a 'financial-industrial group' or clan, masquerading as a party. The core of the SDPU is formed by a group of businessmen known as 'the magnificent seven.'" It is led by Hryhorii Surkis whose brother, Ihor, has alleged ties to the Russian/Ukrainian mafiya. It was Mr. Surkis who used his contacts in the U.S. and Israel to create a business conglomerate named variously as "Ometa," which now has vast interests in Ukraine's petroleum and metallurgical sectors.

During the 1994 election the SDPU supported Leonid Kravchuk. When Mr. Kravchuk lost, the oligarchs brought him into the fold while romancing Leonid Kuchma. Messrs. Kravchuk and Kuchma eventually made up and Mr. Kuchma was embraced by the oligarchs. Among its many controlling interests, according to The Ukraine Insider, the SDPU dominates the Zhydachiv Cellulose Paper Factory, Ukraine's only mass producer of newspaper print, the national TV channel 1 + 1, a Kyiv regional TV channel, "TET," and the newspaper Kievskiye Viedomosti.

According to Dr. Taras Kuzio of the University of Toronto Center for Russian and East European Studies, the SDPU has ties to Russia's Fund for Effective Politics (FEP), which supports stronger economic ties among Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. It was the SDPU, with help from the FEP, which floated the so-called "Brzezinski Plan," a supposed conspiracy on the part of the United States to engineer a Milosevic-like overthrow of President Kuchma and replace him with Viktor Yushchenko. The SDPU wants Russian to be Ukraine's official second language and lends financial support to the extreme nationalist, anti-Western and pro-Kuchma National Rukh for Unity (NRU-Ye) Party.

Mr. Yushchenko, meanwhile, is fighting an uphill battle to be heard. Government control of TV has prevented his people from purchasing television time in Kirovohrad, Mykolaiv and Poltava. That's the least of Mr. Yushchenko's problems, however. If the "auto accident" suffered by Yulia Tymoshenko, head of her own electoral bloc, and other anti-Kuchma candidates who have been found dead or injured are any indication of what lies ahead, Mr. Yushchenko needs to be careful indeed. Critics of Mr. Kuchma are exceedingly accident-prone; some even lose their heads.

Still, there is reason to hope that Mr. Kuchma will be more circumspect in targeting his enemies during the next few days if not longer. FBI forensic experts recently ruled that the audio recordings made by one of Mr. Kuchma's bodyguards implicating the Ukrainian president in the disappearance of Heorhii Gongadze were authentic. This prompted Ukraine's Parliament to order an investigation into the possibility of criminal acts carried out by Mr. Kuchma.

Meanwhile, Ukraine's economy is improving. According to an article by Natalia Feduschak in The Washington Times, "Ukraine had one of the fastest growing economies in Europe last year." A 9 percent growth rate in 2001 combined with an inflation rate of 6 percent create a reason to rejoice. These numbers contrast favorably with an inflation rate of 26 percent in 2000 and 19 percent in 1999. A recent Economic Intelligence Unit country brief reports that "The economic upturn of the last two years in Ukraine has brought into existence a definable, and growing middle class with money to spend on non-essential items." Western-style supermarkets have opened in Kyiv, mobile phone usage now includes the top 20 percent of the population, private home construction is growing, and credit cards are becoming more common.

Also encouraging is the fact that the international investment bank JP Morgan has listed Ukraine as one of the most attractive countries for investors. Ukraine returned a phenomenal 57.1 percent of profit in 2001. In addition, the rating agency Moody's upgraded Ukraine's foreign currency ceiling for bonds and bank deposits.

At the same time, however, Ukraine's standard of living lags behind Russia, Parliament hasn't passed a rational tax code, and continued corruption continues to scare off potential investors and supporters. Following a visit on February 15, the World Bank has decided not to grant another loan to Ukraine until after the March 31 election.

According to Dr. Kuzio, Ukraine has lost ground with Western governments, especially the United States. Given America's growing relationship with Russia, Ukraine can no longer position itself as a buffer against "Russian imperialism." The United States has lost faith in repeated declarations by Ukraine's government officials regarding their commitment to democratic values and European integration. In private, writes Dr. Kuzio, "U.S. officials sometimes describe Ukraine as 'Kuchmastan.' "

Much will be decided on March 31. Ukraine will either have free and open elections, restore Western confidence and take another step towards European integration, or the elections will be rigged, and Ukraine will continue to drift towards greater economic dependence on Russia and even more mob control.

Myron Kuropas' e-mail address is: [email protected].

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