October Revolution celebrated by leaders, elderly with fond memories of Soviet times (11/12/06)

October Revolution celebrated by leaders, elderly with fond memories of Soviet times

by Zenon Zawada
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Once upon a time, the Ukrainian government shut down to commemorate the October Revolution - even years after the Soviet Union's collapse.

Central Kyiv was blocked so that thousands of Communists could parade down the main boulevard, the Khreschatyk.

The national holiday is history now, and so is the related fanfare, as revealed by this year's November 7 commemoration.

The Khreschatyk was off-limits to the Communist marchers, mostly elderly Ukrainians who pine for the stable, secure lives the Communist system once provided.

"It was wonderful, especially during the (Leonid) Brezhnev era," said Illia Rozdobudko, 74, a retired engineer who joined the march. "There was food, there was work, and everything was fine." With every year that passes, fewer marchers turn out. At this year's event more than 2,200 police officers and 3,000 in reserve outnumbered the 1,700 Communists and Progressive Socialists who marched.

They prevented any fights with more than 300 nationalists, who held their first November 7 counter-demonstration, commemorating Soviet communism's millions of victims at the Holodomor victims monument at St. Michael's Square with a panakhyda, or requiem service.

The nationalists burned portraits of Vladimir Lenin, while their leaders, including National Deputy Yevhen Hirnyk, Svoboda Kyiv City Organization Chair Andrii Mokhnyk and Ukrainian National Assembly-Ukrainian National Self-Defense Kyiv leader Ihor Mazur, delivered speeches. They called for a ban on the Communist Party of Ukraine.

The Svoboda All-Ukrainian Union wanted to march simultaneously along the same route traditionally used by the Communists, from the Arsenal to Lenin's statue, located across from the Bessara- bskyi market, but was forbidden from doing so by Kyiv's Shevchenko Regional Court. The same court denied either side access to Independence Square or the Khreschatyk.

The Communists were allowed their annual meeting on European Square, where they demanded their holiday be restored to official government status.

"We remember the beginning of Ukraine's independence, which was established Novemer 7, 1917," said Petro Symonenko, the chair of the Communist Party of Ukraine.

Proceeding to Kyiv's statue of Vladimir Lenin, the Communists were furious that police forbid them from walking on the Khreschatyk where cars and trucks hummed along during the city's typical morning bustle.

Clearly nostalgic for the good old days, elderly women pushing their way past police officers and forced their way onto the street anyway, drawing honks from zooming cars.

Meanwhile, the gathering at the Lenin statue looked like a Halloween costume party more than a political rally for the workers of the world. A few young men donned classic Red Army uniforms of the October Revolution, while their female counterparts wore nurse outfits of the era.

One fellow bearing a striking resemblance to Lenin himself gave interviews to television reporters.

"Lenin was a wise man," Oleksander Skliarov, 69, said of the man he emulated. "Whatever they say about him, he was no fool. When I read his works, there were phrases that the Communists themselves didn't know. People respect Lenin everywhere."

Many of the Communist sympathizers demonstrated they had lost touch with reality, or remain sheltered from it.

Tetiana Ivanivna, 66, who didn't offer her last name but only her patronymic, said Lenin influenced all the teachings of the world, "including yoga." He was a selfless man who gave his whole life for the people and taught the world "true democracy," she said.

Her colleague, Tamara Yakivna, sounded as if she were repeating the lessons she learned in Communist elementary school. "Lenin was a great man," she said. "Such people are born very rarely. He created the theory of revolutionary struggle. Foreigners come here to learn Lenin's teachings and arrive on May 1."

The Soviet Union's legacy will be written in gold letters in world history, Tamara Yakivna said. "Thanks to the Soviet Union, there was peace on earth," she said.

The October Revolution is commemorated on November 7 because the Russian tsar had employed the Julian calendar at the time. The Revolution occurred on October 25, according to the Gregorian calendar.

On that day, Lenin and the Bolsheviks stormed the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg and overthrew the liberal-oriented Provisional Government, declaring authority in the name of the working classes under the slogan, "All power to the soviets" (councils).

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