FACES AND PLACES: Send in the clowns! (07/23/06)

FACES AND PLACES

by Myron B. Kuropas

Send in the clowns!

Remember "Send in the Clowns"? A great song from the past that could have been written by Viktor Yushchenko.

The fourth verse goes like this:

"Don't you love farce?
"My fault I fear,
"I thought you'd want what I want,
"Sorry my dear.
"But where are the clowns?
"Send in the clowns.
"Don't bother, they're here."

Yes, they're here. The clowns, many of them, jumping up and down, yelling, shouting, doing somersaults, running in circles, smacking each other, falling on their faces, sneaking up on each other from behind, locking doors.

Can't you just hear the circus ringmaster shouting: Laaa-dies and Gentlemen, I give you the Parrr-lia-ment of Ukraine."

The world laughs. Ukraine weeps.

When did it all go wrong? What happened to the Orange Revolution? Why was Ukraine's moment in the sun so short?

For me, it all began in the Parliament the day Viktor Yushchenko was inaugurated. I was there. I heard his acceptance speech. I was bothered, but I didn't know why. Now I know. Viktor sounded like Calvin Coolidge. He had a golden opportunity to describe his vision passionately and convincingly. He didn't.

Viktor had a second chance on the maidan. Thousands of people were yelling "Yushchenko! Yushchenko! Viktor spoke about unity, one Ukraine, working together. Good stuff. His delivery? Lifeless. This kind of opportunity comes once in a lifetime and Viktor, poor fellow, blew it.

I walked around the maidan hours before the ceremony. People were coming from all regions of Ukraine. Many had signs. I talked with people from Zhytomyr, Kharkiv, Lviv. They seemed to be saying, "Today, Ukraine is one."

How can you mess up when, for a brief moment in time, the people, the nation, are right there with you? They were excited, hopeful, passionate, ready to storm the heavens if necessary. It was an instant in time that will never return, and Viktor wasted it. Instead of whipping up the crowd with unforgettable rhetoric, Viktor's delivery seemed to be saying, "slow down, don't get too excited." I observed the faces of the crowd. The smiles were gone. No one moved. If Viktor's goal was to bring the people down to earth, he succeeded.

As I left the maidan, I was nonplused. It's my problem, I thought, it's not important. So Viktor isn't Winston Churchill. Big deal. Viktor is an accountant, a financial whiz, a nuts-and-bolts kind of guy. Things will get better, I told myself. I returned to the United States and forgot about Ukraine. And then it happened. Viktor dismissed his entire Cabinet? What? The entire Cabinet? Wow!

Why? I asked. What happened? No one could give me a straight answer. There were theories, of course. Viktor was honest, his team was corrupt. Viktor was afraid of Yulia. Viktor was under the thumb of Petro Poroshenko, his "kum," a millionaire aching to become billionaire. Yulia is Lucretia Borgia, Eva Peron, Hillary Clinton, take your pick. Yulia is on a power trip. Viktor is afraid of her. Viktor is inept, a gutless wonder. Viktor is being manipulated by Petro.

Did Viktor take bold steps against corruption? No. Did he go after those who poisoned him? No. (His inaction led conspiracy theorists to suggest Viktor poisoned himself.) Did Viktor demand immediate justice for Heorhii Gongadze's murderers? No. Did he introduce one initiative, make one move, one action, that would demonstrate his commitment to justice, honesty and the Orange way?

Viktor came to America and appeared on "The Larry King Show." Larry asked softball questions that even an alderman could answer easily. Viktor, however, stumbled, mumbled and seemed distracted. When Larry asked about Viktor's son tooling around Kyiv in a BMW and having money to burn while many people in Ukraine were hurting financially, a polished politician would have said something like: "My son and I had a long, heart-to-heart talk about that and I believe he now understands his responsibilities as the son of Ukraine's president." End of discussion! Did Viktor say that? Not even close. He rambled on and on about the car not being his son's, his son sharing an apartment with his buddy, his buddy loaning his son money ..." Sad. Another golden opportunity squandered.

As we know, things went from bad to worse.

Elections were held, and Our Ukraine came in third. Yulia's party came in second. Did Viktor make nice-nice with Yulia? No.

The new game in town is musical chairs. Viktor held consensus meetings. He had an agreement. He didn't have an agreement. He had come to terms with Yulia and, yes, she would be prime minister again. But Petro would be Verkhovna Rada chairman. Wrong again. Oleksander Moroz defects and forms his own coalition. Now Oleksander heads the Rada. The Communists, marginalized before, are players again. The other Viktor, Yanukovych, will be prime minister. And so it goes ... back to the maidan. This time, however, Orange isn't the color of choice. Think blue, the color of the other Viktor's Regions Party.

As I write this, Yulia and many in Our Ukraine are calling for new elections. Given the level of disillusionment with President Yushchenko, people fear that the Orange coalition will get a worse drubbing than the last time.

Russia, of course, is a major player in all of this. As before, Russians will dump money into the opposition because they want Ukraine back. They don't want NATO on their doorstep and they're afraid of Yulia because, despite her deficiencies, as James Sherr of the United Kingdom Defense Academy writes, she is "an astute and courageous politician with the ability and determination to oppose them ... they fear that Tymoshenko ... will purge the energy sector and security services of people aligned with or suborned by the Kremlin."

The clock is ticking, Mr. Yushchenko. Once again, Yulia can save your shaky coalition. You need each other. Swallow your pride and go to her, hat in hand.

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

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