ANALYSIS: "Bandits to Parliament" rather than "Bandits to Prison" (01/29/06)

ANALYSIS

"Bandits to Parliament" rather than "Bandits to Prison"

by Taras Kuzio
Eurasia Daily Monitor

President Viktor Yushchenko is insisting that he will hold a referendum on the constitutional reforms that went into effect on January 1 (see Eurasia Daily Monitor, January 3). These comments, and others, suggest Mr. Yushchenko is increasingly out of touch and that he has poor strategists. Together these two factors denote weak leadership.

Interviewed by the Financial Times (January 13), President Yushchenko said the "changes to the Constitution were an anti-constitutional action, hidden from the people." He added that there was no referendum and the new provisions were not discussed in Parliament.

These factors may indeed have been absent. Nevertheless, five questions spring to mind that suggest a referendum is unlikely.

First, why did Mr. Yushchenko agree to the constitutional reforms during the December 2004 roundtable at a time when he controlled the streets of Kyiv with over a million Orange supporters? Mr. Yushchenko also had the support of the military, intelligence services and elements of the Internal Affairs Ministry, while both President Leonid Kuchma and his former Prime Minister and chosen successor Viktor Yanukovych were increasingly powerless.

Second, Mr. Yushchenko's Our Ukraine bloc always supported constitutional reforms (unlike the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc) and merely differed with the Kuchma camp and the left on their timing. Our Ukraine insisted the reforms should come into effect after the March 2006 elections while the Kuchma camp and the left supported their introduction after the 2004 elections. In agreeing to the reforms' introduction in January 2006 Our Ukraine obtained the timing of their introduction that it had sought.

Third, why does President Yushchenko need to continue to hold extensive powers, as in the pre-2006 Constitution? Mr. Yushchenko has possessed President Kuchma's extensive executive powers throughout 2005, but has failed to make use of them. Fourth, why has Mr. Yushchenko waited so long to call a referendum? If agreeing to undertake constitutional reforms was merely a tactical ruse to overcome the Orange crisis and hold a re-run of the second round of the 2004 presidential election on December 26, 2004, why did Mr. Yushchenko not seek to hold a referendum immediately after coming to power in January 2005? Then Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko would have wholeheartedly supported such a move at a time when the opposition was still in disarray.

Fifth, Mr. Yushchenko needs the support of the Socialists in any parliamentary coalition in the 2006 Parliament. The Socialists will not remain allied with President Yushchenko over two policies. First, if he goes ahead with a constitutional referendum, they will not support it. Second, Mr. Yushchenko backs NATO membership for Ukraine, while the Socialists oppose it.

These five questions suggest any constitutional referendum will be held only after the March elections if they go badly for Mr. Yushchenko. In other words, Mr. Yushchenko would be threatening a referendum, like Mr. Kuchma in 1996, because he did not like the political configuration of the 2006 Parliament.

President Yushchenko's fears are a product of his own weak political will. His rallying cry in the 2004 elections and the Orange Revolution was "Bandits to Prison!" But, the only "bandits" to have suffered this fate have been lower- and middle-level officials. As in the Kuchma era, senior officials have again escaped justice.

Not a single high ranking "bandit" that Mr. Yushchenko pointed to during the Orange Revolution has been criminally charged. Instead of being sent to "prison," these "bandits" will be elected to the Verkhovna Rada on the Party of the Regions list and thereby obtain immunity for the duration of the five-year (2006-2011) parliamentary term. Kuchma era leftover Procurator General Sviatoslav Piskun is on the Party of the Regions list, as are a multitude of the previous regime's high-ranking officials who were never charged.

Recent polls suggest that the Party of the Regions is set to have the largest faction in the 2006 Parliament. Mr. Yanukovych is promoting Ukraine's wealthiest oligarch, Rynat Akhmetov, who is on the Party of the Regions list, for prime minister and president.

Thirty percent of Kyiv residents see Mr. Akhmetov as a "criminal authority of the Donetsk mafia." Similar numbers see him as an "oligarch" and the "political khaziayin [master] of Viktor Yanukovych and the Party of the Regions" (Ukrayinska Pravda, December 19, 2005).

The ratings of the Party of the Regions have steadily grown, especially since the September 2005 government crisis and split in the Orange camp. A new poll gave the Party of the Regions 31 percent support - a growth of over 10 percent in the last four months (UNIAN news service, January 13). Other polls give the Party of the Regions closer to 23 percent (Ukrayinska Pravda, December 21, 2005) or even higher ratings of 34 percent (Kyiv International Institute Sociology [KIIS], December 2005).

In the most recent poll, the two halves of the Orange camp (the Our Ukraine People's Union [OUPU] and the Tymoshenko Bloc) have a total of 29.2 percent. Together with the Socialists, the combined Orange camp could rise to 34 percent - only 3 percent higher than the Party of the Regions. President Yushchenko remains publicly convinced that these polls will not translate into an election defeat. Speaking to the Financial Times (January 13), Mr. Yushchenko said the OUPU will obtain the largest number of seats in the 2006 Parliament. Based on current polls, this seems unlikely. The poll cited by UNIAN (January 13) gave the Party of the Regions 31 percent support and the OUPU only 13 percent. KIIS gave the Party of the Regions 34 percent, the Tymoshenko Bloc 21 percent and the OUPU 18 percent.

The Tymoshenko Bloc has called for the signing of a joint election alliance between the OUPU, the Socialists and itself (Ukrayinska Pravda, January 17). Such an alliance could lay the foundation for a parliamentary coalition that would re-unite the Orange Revolutionaries. The OUPU and the Tymoshenko Bloc have informally agreed that whichever of their two forces comes in first has the right to nominate the prime minister. In many polls, the Tymoshenko Bloc comes ahead of the OUPU.

President Yushchenko has stated on a number of occasions that there will be no "revenge" from supporters of the former Kuchma regime. "Talk of any kind of revenge is not on. Yesterday's forces will remain yesterday's" (Ukrayinska Pravda, December 26, 2005). Yushchenko also refuses to acknowledge that there is public disappointment in his policies (Financial Times, January 13).

Such confidence and optimism are all the more surprising given the growing lead of the Party of the Regions. President Yushchenko has to take the blame for his election promise of "Bandits to Prison!" turning into "Bandits to Parliament," where they will create the largest faction.

Dr. 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).

| Home Page |