ANALYSIS: Will contradictions undermine Yanukovych's election campaign? (07/25/04)

ANALYSIS

Will contradictions undermine Yanukovych's election campaign?

by Taras Kuzio
Eurasia Daily Monitor

When Viktor Yanukovych was appointed Ukraine's prime minister in November 2002, he immediately became the heir-apparent for the 2004 presidential election. He was duly made the pro-presidential candidate when the campaign season formally opened on July 4. Initially, his inevitability was not considered significant, because presidential advisors believed that the constitutional changes launched by President Leonid Kuchma in August 2003 would be adopted the following year. These changes sought to transfer power from the executive to the prime minister, making it irrelevant who would be elected to the soon-to-be-ceremonial presidency in October 2004.

But this strategy never went off as planned. In April the Verkhovna Rada failed to approve the constitutional changes contained in Bill 3105. The pro-Kuchma camp did not give up, and in June deputies voted in favor of Bill 4180, which is nearly identical to 3105. A second reading, which requires more than 300 votes, will be held in September.

The pending changes would allow President Kuchma to remain in power until the 2006 parliamentary elections by becoming prime minister. Alternatively, they would permit Mr. Yanukovych to continue as prime minister. In either case, the prime minister would possess greater power than the newly elected president.

These last-ditch efforts to amend the Constitution only one month before the elections indicate that the pro-Kuchma camp fears Viktor Yushchenko will win the elections and inherit President Kuchma's powers. Panic now overshadows the pro-Kuchma camp's concerns about Ukraine's possible suspension from the Council of Europe, which advised in January and again in June that Ukraine should not make constitutional changes during an election year.

Continued attempts to railroad through constitutional changes also reflect the pro-presidential camp's lukewarm approach to Mr. Yanukovych's candidacy. Although on the surface there is unity, underneath there is widespread dismay that Mr. Yanukovych was chosen as their "joint candidate." One strike against the current prime minister is his criminal record: he has been sentenced to prison twice - once for robbery and once for violence. Polls indicate that 69 percent of Ukrainians will not vote for a candidate with a criminal record (Ukrainska Pravda, June 3) and 61.8 percent would back a law prohibiting convicted criminals from standing for president (Zerkalo Nedeli, June 5-11).

Former Soviet political prisoner Vasyl Ovsienko has called upon his fellow Ukrainians to not allow the election of the "immoral" Mr. Yanukovych (Ukrainska Pravda, July 6). Mr. Ovsienko cited Article 5 of the Constitution, which permits Ukrainians to use any means to remove those who take power after having lost the election.

Mr. Ovsienko's emotional remarks reflect the brittle election atmosphere, which is the most explosive in Ukraine's post-Soviet history. The potential threat of instability and violence is higher than in 1994, when the U.S. National Intelligence Council released a highly exaggerated report warning of Ukraine's impending collapse. Ten years later, the authorities now have far more to lose. Now they actually fear an opposition victory.

The main opposition to Messrs. Kuchma and Yanukovych revolves around Viktor Yushchenko. Mr. Yushchenko launched his candidacy on July 4 with a mass rally of 50,000 Ukrainians - one of the largest demonstrations in Kyiv since 1992. The demonstrators ended their vigil at the Central Election Commission. Our Ukraine National Deputy Taras Stetskiv warned that, after voting on election day, Yushchenko supporters would return and stay until the "right result" was announced. Mr. Stetskiv's comments were a tacit threat to repeat the Georgian and Serbian revolutions should Mr. Yushchenko not be declared the winner. However different Ukrainians are from the Serbs and the Georgians, the authorities nevertheless fear history repeating itself. Rada Chairman Volodymyr Lytvyn suggested that perhaps it would be better to have the opposition win the presidency rather than face an anti-oligarch revolution.

The prevailing mood is a product of two factors. First, Ukrainians fear widespread election fraud. In the April mayoral elections in Mukachiv, the Our Ukraine candidate won, but the Territorial Election Commission declared a pro-Kuchma candidate victorious. Despite the adoption of two critical parliamentary resolutions, not a single person involved in the Mukachiv fraud has been punished. Not surprisingly, three-quarters of Ukrainians do not believe the presidential elections will be free and fair. To prevent a repeat of Mukachiv, Mr. Yushchenko's supporters believe they need to win in the first round and avoid a run-off. If the authorities repeat their Mukachiv tactics, violence between opposition observers and skinheads deployed to disrupt the balloting will be inevitable.

Second, there are at least two reasons to doubt that Mr. Yanukovych will win. One reason is that he is the authorities' candidate in a country where the authorities are widely despised. Within Ukraine and abroad it is widely believed that Mr. Yanukovych could only win in a rigged election. Mr. Lytvyn advised Mr. Yanukovych that it would have been better if he was an independent candidate, rather than one supported by the authorities.

Another reason is Mr. Yanukovych himself. Mr. Yanukovych's circle in Kyiv consists of the same cronies he had as chairman of the Donetsk Oblast from 1997 to 2002. These "advisors" were involved in numerous highly unscrupulous activities. The July 2001 murder of Donetsk journalist Ihor Aleksandrov, who had uncovered high-level corruption, remains unresolved. Opposition deputies believe the Donetsk Administration, Procurator's Office, and Internal Affairs Ministry continue to cooperate with organized crime. Aleksandrov's murder took place when Mr. Yanukovych was Donetsk Oblast chairman and the current procurator general, Hennadii Vasiliev, was head of the Donetsk Procurator's Office (Ukraina Moloda, July 7). Mr. Vasiliev is also involved in covering up the murder of opposition journalist Heorhii Gongadze in fall 2000.

Mr. Yanukovych's promises, and those of his Party of Regions, to support free and fair elections, oppose the use of "administrative resources," battle corruption (which he described as higher than in the "worst African countries"), reduce the shadow economy, ensure that everyone is equal before the law and support media freedom are met with total disbelief (Ukrainska Pravda, July 5). These "remain, as before, empty words" (Zerkalo Nedeli, July 3-9).

Mr. Yanukovych is also using "administrative resources" by refusing to go on leave as prime minister. He benefits from continued attacks on the opposition, both public (i.e., attempts to indict Mr. Yushchenko's ally, Yulia Tymoshenko) and in the form of provocations (i.e., fake leaflets, fascists told to trumpet their support for Mr. Yushchenko). A new book launched to coincide with the election campaign includes unfounded allegations of Mr. Yushchenko's corruption (temnik.com.ua, July 7). Despite the illegality of foreigners working for election candidates, Russian "political technologists" are very actively working for the Yanukovych camp.

These fundamental contradictions in Mr. Yanukovych's campaign could be his ultimate undoing.

Taras Kuzio is visiting professor at the Elliot School of International Affairs, George Washington University. The articles above, which originally appeared in The Jamestown Foundation's Eurasia Daily Monitor, are reprinted here with permission from the foundation (www.jamestown.org).

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