ANALYSIS: Fear drives political reform (09/07/03)

ANALYSIS

Fear drives political reform

by Taras Kuzio
RFE/RL Newsline

Pro-presidential blocs and parties fought the 2002 Ukrainian parliamentary elections in support of strengthening the executive. This tallied with President Leonid Kuchma's own preference since his first election in 1994 for a Russian-and CIS-style "super-presidential" constitution. This was also the aim of the flawed and internationally unrecognized April 2000 referendum.

However, Mr. Kuchma, failed to obtain his desired "super-presidential" constitution and had to compromise with the Parliament. The result was a "semi-presidential" regime that has meant conflict between the legislature and executive with neither side dominant over the other.

In Ukraine, as in the Commonwealth of Independent States, election programs rarely translate into policy after the elections. The pro-presidential For a United Ukraine bloc disintegrated into eight parliamentary factions only a month after the elections. None of these successor factions is willing to accept the bloc's responsibility to voters for its election promises.

This would be impossible in one key area, political reform, because the successor factions to For a United Ukraine and its allied Social Democratic Party-United (SDPU) have radically changed their policies since the elections. The election program of For a United Ukraine called for the strengthening of executive power (i.e., a move toward a "super-presidential" system).

Yet, in August 2002, President Kuchma announced a program of political reform with the ostensible purpose of changing Ukraine from a "semi-presidential" to a parliamentary-presidential regime. This would ostensibly signal a move away from the typical CIS "super-presidential" system that For a United Ukraine had supported, to an East-Central European and Baltic constitution. As Freedom House's annual "Nations in Transit" survey of 27 post-Communist states has shown, parliamentary-presidential (or pure parliamentary) systems have been more conducive to democratization.

This then begs the question as to whether President Kuchma, when he announced his political reform proposals in draft form in March, had as his ultimate purpose to advance Ukraine's democratization after its regression since the late 1990s.

The answer to this question is "no," as it is fear that drives President Kuchma's political reform and the support given to it by his centrist oligarchic parliamentary allies. These reform proposals aim to undertake two steps. First, to strip all power away from the executive as an insurance policy in case the opposition wins the 2004 presidential elections. At all costs an opposition president must not be allowed to possess the same degree of power as Mr. Kuchma currently possesses.

Second, to prolong Mr. Kuchma's term in office by two years by changing the Constitution of Ukraine so that all elections would be held in the same year (i.e., postponing the 2004 elections to 2006 when parliamentary and local elections are due). A third term for President Kuchma is not seriously being discussed because even his allies know he would have colossal problems in winning an extra term because of his constantly low ratings of 5 percent.

Despite cosmetic attempts at improving the executive's and government's standing in public eyes and more sinister black operations against the opposition in the media and against their business supporters, public opinion polls continue to show the same results.

Our Ukraine leader Viktor Yushchenko continues to obtain 21 percent to 30 percent support, followed by Communist leader Petro Symonenko. Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych's rating continues to rise but still remains far lower and less than 10 percent. Mr. Yanukovych, who represents the Donetsk clan, is not a candidate that some other oligarchic groups would like to see elected president. The presidential administration still has not found a neutral candidate acceptable to all clans who is able to take on and win against Mr. Yushchenko.

Former presidential adviser Oleksander Volkov indirectly admitted that fear drives Mr. Kuchma's political reform. Mr. Volkov, like President Kuchma, resents the passivity of the pro-presidential majority, not all of whom are threatened by a Yushchenko victory in 2004. The subset of this is the fear that some pro-presidential groups will reach separate deals with Mr. Yushchenko, a process that has already started.

President Kuchma is fearful that once he is no longer in power he will have less control over his parliamentary supporters who are not allied through ideology but by fear of their businesses being closed and corruption charges leveled against them. As Mr. Volkov admitted, "the largest component [of the pro-presidential majority] has not even a clue as to what is going on. And it does not want to have a clue."

Mr. Volkov was less critical of Mr. Yushchenko than Mr. Kuchma. Nevertheless, he admitted that Mr. Yushchenko's allies were those "who we all fear" if he became president. As president under the current constitution, Mr. Yushchenko would, Mr. Volkov warned, be in charge of the security forces, and he was fearful that this would lead to people being imprisoned. Interviewed by the newspaper Zerkalo Nedeli, Mr. Volkov called upon President Kuchma to seek guarantees for himself and his "team, which has faithfully served him over 10 years."

In effect, Mr. Volkov admitting that President Yushchenko would be too weak to prevent his allies from changing Ukraine's virtual program against corruption into a real one and that the main victims of this would be oligarchs. Extending President Kuchma's term in office through postponing elections, which Mr. Volkov supports, would also defer the question of Mr. Kuchma's fate and whether he should be granted immunity from prosecution.

On July 7, when the Verkhovna Rada was stalemated over President Kuchma's political reform, the president launched a vicious attack on Mr. Yushchenko for blocking the reforms. Mr. Yushchenko replied that the president was attempting a "constitutional coup" to prolong his term in office, which showed a "complete degradation of Ukrainian politics." This was the first occasion when Mr. Kuchma had openly showed that he perceived Mr. Yushchenko to be his main threat in the transition to the post-Kuchma era.

Dr. Taras Kuzio is a resident fellow at the Center for Russian and East European Studies, University of Toronto.

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