ANALYSIS: Tymoshenko to become Ukrainian prime minister (02/06/05)

ANALYSIS

Tymoshenko to become Ukrainian prime minister

by Taras Kuzio
Eurasia Daily Monitor

One day after he was inaugurated as Ukraine's third president, Viktor Yushchenko appointed a powerful and radical triumvirate. Yulia Tymoshenko, of the eponymous bloc, was named prime minister; businessman Petro Poroshenko as secretary of the National Security and Defense Council; and Oleksander Zinchenko, the head of the Yushchenko election campaign, as state secretary.

Mr. Zinchenko's position replaces that of head of the presidential administration. Of the three positions, only Ms. Tymoshenko's requires parliamentary approval, and Verkhovna Rada Chairman Volodymyr Lytvyn said he expects her to obtain a large majority when she is proposed this coming week.

Why Tymoshenko? One reason is that a secret agreement between Mr. Yushchenko and Ms. Tymoshenko stated that if Mr. Yushchenko won, then he would propose her as his prime minister. The Yushchenko camp denied that such a document existed (Ukrainska Pravda, January 20), but it was leaked to the anti-Yushchenko website temnik.com.ua (January 24) by the Viktor Yanukovych team.

Another reason for Ms. Tymoshenko's nomination was that alternative candidates were unpalatable. Mr. Poroshenko had angled for the position but, as a major businessman, this would have undermined Mr. Yushchenko's policy of separating business and politics. Mr. Poroshenko is often labeled as the "oligarch" in the Yushchenko camp.

A third, more pertinent factor rests on President Yushchenko's policy aims. Ms. Tymoshenko is ideally suited to be a radical prime minister during the short period between now and the implementation of constitutional changes either in September 2005 or March 2006.

Ms. Tymoshenko has anti-oligarch credentials. In the Yushchenko government of 2000-2001 she was instrumental in efforts to eliminate loopholes in the energy sector that had been exploited by the oligarchs; the move returned over $2 billion to the budget. She has stated, "The oligarchs are cowards. As soon as they realize that the system has changed, they will be forced to change their methods or go to jail" (The Independent, December 7).

Finally, Ms. Tymoshenko was chosen to reward the maidan, the protesters in Independence Square who supported the Orange Revolution. Many of its young participants are ideologically closer to the more radical Ms. Tymoshenko than to the more moderate Mr. Yushchenko. During the Orange Revolution she was labeled the "goddess of revolution" (AP, December 3).

Her newfound hero-like status completes the evolution of her image. The process began in February 2001 when, as vice prime minister responsible for energy issues in the Mr. Yushchenko government, she was arrested. She was later released, and in subsequent years some courts attempted to indict her while others dismissed the charges. Ms. Tymoshenko's future rested on a Yushchenko victory. If Mr. Yanukovych won the elections, she would have to flee abroad or go to prison.

Government attempts to remove this key Yushchenko ally came to a head in mid-July, one week into the presidential campaign, when pro-presidential parliamentary factions began discussing a motion to have her arrested. The entire pro-presidential bloc supported the motion, including moderates who now seek to ingratiate themselves with President Yushchenko (Ukrainska Pravda, July 16, 2004). The Procurator General's Office then issued fresh indictments (Ukrainska Pravda, September 15, 2004). Also in July 2004, Russia issued a search warrant for Mr. Tymoshenko and placed her on Interpol's wanted list (Interpol.org).

This step backfired, because now Prime Minister-designate Tymoshenko cannot travel to Russia. Russian political technologist Sergei Markov, who worked for the Yanukovych side, predicted that Russian prosecutors would soon drop their case against Ms. Tymoshenko. Mr. Markov also has changed course, asserting: "People have said Ms. Tymoshenko is a radical politician, that Russia is at war against Ms. Tymoshenko and that her nomination will be negative for Russia. I think that is absolutely wrong" (Financial Times, January 25).

Mr. Markov's apparent shift might be attributed to Ms. Tymoshenko's confusing politics. In an op-ed piece written for the Russian newspaper Viedomosti (January 11) she talked in language that ought to make Ukrainian nationalists shudder. Ukrainian-Russian relations are "rooted in our common history," she said. Both peoples belong to the "same civilization" and the "same geo-economic zone." Furthermore, she wrote that President Vladimir Putin and Mr. Yushchenko have similar goals in removing oligarchs from power and that both states will re-join Europe together. Ukraine may join NATO but only with Russia, with whom Ukraine should unify its military-industrial complex.

Despite these Russophile views, Ms. Tymoshenko remains the darling of the right populist and nationalist camps. Crowds numbering tens of thousands rallied in Lviv in support of her bid to be nominated prime minister. Yet, her radical, anti-Kuchma, and anti-oligarch views outweigh both her own oligarch past and her Russophile views.

Ms. Tymoshenko first entered politics with the dissident oligarch Hromada Party, led by Pavlo Lazarenko. After Mr. Lazarenko fled Ukraine in early 1999, she created her own Fatherland Party, which merged in 2002 with the populist-right Conservative Republican Party led by Stepan Khmara.

Ms. Tymoshenko took a leading part in the anti-Kuchma protests during the Kuchmagate crisis, when the opposition created the National Salvation Front (NFS). At that time, then-Prime Minister Yushchenko opposed the anti-Kuchma protests. Most of the political parties that made up the NFS, apart from the Socialists, later joined the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc, which finished fourth in the 2002 elections with 7.26 percent.

Ms. Tymoshenko has views similar to those of Mr. Yushchenko and Socialist Party leader Oleksander Moroz on the need to implement radical democratic reforms, remove the oligarchs from power and combat corruption. But she will differ with President Yushchenko on some aspects of economic reform because, as she pointed out, "I am not a market fundamentalist" (The Independent, December 7).

Her parliamentary faction was the only one to vote against the December 2004 compromise package that includes constitutional changes. Ms. Tymoshenko has always supported strong executive powers. In contrast, Mr. Yushchenko's Our Ukraine differed from the left and the pro-presidential camp only in the schedule for introducing constitutional changes (i.e., immediately after the 2004 presidential elections or after the 2006 parliamentary elections).

Ms. Tymoshenko's nomination will send shivers down the spines of Ukraine's oligarchs, particularly those who are grouped around Viktor Medvedchuk's Social Democratic Party - United.

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

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