EDITORIAL: Halted at the crossroads (07/30/06)

EDITORIAL

Halted at the crossroads

By now we thought things would be clearer in Ukraine: President Viktor Yushchenko would have either disbanded the Verkhovna Rada - in accordance with the Constitution he could have done so as of July 25 - or he would have acted on the nomination of his erstwhile archrival Viktor Yanukovych for the position of prime minister. And Ukraine would have moved on.

But Ukraine, well, it's Ukraine.

And here we are, four months after the parliamentary elections, two months after the new Parliament began its session, five weeks after the Orange parliamentary majority had been struck, and two and a half weeks after the new Anti-Crisis Coalition was proclaimed, with nothing resolved, no government in place and the Verkhovna Rada at a virtual standstill.

As this issue of The Weekly was being put to bed, President Yushchenko had gathered together the country's political leaders, including heads of the five parliamentary factions, for a roundtable discussion on the crisis. As press time approached, it was clear only that all had agreed that Ukraine is in a political crisis and that the priorities of the government need to be delineated. But there was disagreement on how the parliamentary crisis should be resolved.

It seems to us that President Yushchenko is stalling, once again. These endless discussions and "dialogue" (to use the president's preferred term), frankly, are not doing anyone - least of all the people of Ukraine - any good.

Thus, Ukraine remains halted at the crossroads.

President Yushchenko, it appears, does not want to admit that he lost, and lost big, in the parliamentary elections in March. But, that's the way democracy works: you win some and you lose some. Whichever is the case, the people have their say and their elected officials have to deal with it.

And, it must be underscored that July 2006 is not November 2004. This time, Viktor Yanukovych and his Party of the Regions won fair and square. Yulia Tymoshenko and her eponymous bloc gained popular support. And Mr. Yushchenko, once the revered leader of the Orange Revolution, found himself in a greatly weakened position.

President Yushchenko now has few options. He can disband the Verkhovna Rada and call for new parliamentary elections, in which his party is threatened with getting even less popular support. He can agree to enter into what is being dubbed a grand coalition with the Regions, the Socialists and the Communists, in which case he can influence the choice of the prime minister but risks political suicide as those who supported him and the Orange Revolution will desert him. Or he can choose to not the join with the Regions, in which case Mr. Yanukovych - many of whose goals are directly opposed to the president's - is just about certain to become prime minister.

So, it appears that President Yushchenko is stuck, as the old adage says, between a rock and a hard place. (And, let's not mince words, most of this mess is Mr. Yushchenko's own doing.) In the meantime, the people of Ukraine are forgotten, the world is experiencing Ukraine fatigue and any good will left over from the Orange Revolution is being squandered.

As former President Leonid Kravchuk used to say: "Mayemo to scho mayemo." The best English rendering of that truism: "It is what it is."

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