With a war taking place in the streets of many Ukrainian cities, issues related to personal and national security quickly became the top concern for a majority of Ukrainians. But presidential candidates for the election are failing to offer comprehensive solutions.
Mariya Volkova, an analyst at the Ilko
Kucheriv Democratic Initiatives Foundation, says that 72 percent of
Ukrainians are concerned about the country splitting, seizure of its
territory by other states and the collapse of the economy as the
result of the social unrest.
But less than three weeks before the
May 25 vote, the top five presidential candidates appear to have no plan
to combat separatism in eastern and southern Ukraine, growing crime
and gang rule nationwide and threat of territorial integrity from
Russia.
Security issues merely get a fleeting
mention in most of the candidates’ election programs. Oleksiy Melnyk,
co-director of Foreign Policy and International Security Studies at
the Kyiv-based Razumkov think tank, is worried that “lack of their
attention to security issues despite the urgency of the issue of
national security” means no large-scale effective reform of the
security sector any time soon.
For example, Petro Poroshenko, the most
most likely next president of Ukraine, offers “to increase funding
for modernization and strengthen of the Ukrainian armed forces and
other structures on which the protection against the external
aggression depend.”
Vitaliy Kovalchuk, head of Poroshenko’s
election campaign, says the plan is in the works, though. “Our
team is composing a plan for national security these days. Ensuring
the country’s defense is the main issue of our plan,” Kovalchuk
says.
A former foreign minister, Poroshenko
believes that diplomacy can deter Russia’s aggression. In a recent
speech, he promised to “use all my diplomatic talent and political
experience to provide the de-escalation of the conflict, avoid war,
preserve peace and find the acceptable ways of cooperation with
Russia, preliminary economic cooperation.”
Yulia Tymoshenko, the former prime
minister and political prisoner who ranks second by popularity in the
polls, spared the whole chapter in her program to the issue of
national security, but the program also lacks specifics. She says she
would “approve a new military doctrine” and “create a
well-equipped contract army” but does not say how and when it will
be done.
Melnyk of the Razumkov center says that
Tymoshenko tops the ranking of most populist candidates when security
issues are concerned. “Things like ‘increasing expenses for the
defense [of the country] up to five percent of the country’ GDP,’
‘building apartments for military officers’ and ‘providing
financial assistance to families of Ukrainian soldiers who were
wounded or killed in Crimea’ are unrealistic because of the current
economic situation,” the expert says.
Both top candidates express, in various
forms, the idea that affiliation with Europe will help solve
Ukraine’s security problems.
Poroshenko says that alignment with
European foreign and security policy could guarantee safety for the
nation. “I consider Ukraine’s integration to the EU as additional
guarantee of Ukraine’s security within the limits of the common
European security space,” his program says.
He stops short of claiming that Ukraine
needs NATO membership, unlike Tymoshenko, who has repeatedly said
throughout her campaign that “NATO is the best choice for Ukraine.”
She also says Ukraine needs to
“strengthen cooperation with the EU in the field of common security
and defense policy.” Melnyk calls it “the only constructive
proposal concerning the national security in the electoral programs
of the leaders of the presidential race.”
Both top candidates who represent the
troubled southeast of Ukraine, ex-deputy prime minister Serhiy
Tigipko and ex-Kharkiv governor Mykhaylo Dobkin avoid the security
issues in their programs altogether.
Tigipko, who was expelled from the
Party of Regions last month after the party congress failed to
support his candidacy to run for the top office, urges to find a
“pragmatic approach” to foreign policy – a code word for more
negotiations with Russia.
The Party of Regions candidate Dobkin
says Ukraine needs to conduct a Russia-friendly policy: “I stand
for the immediate reestablishment of friendly and partner relations
with Russia.”
Communist Party leader Petro Symonenko
also aims to reestablish good neighborly relations with Russia as a
way to save Ukraine from “the final destruction of the social
achievements of the Soviet power.” He says Ukraine needs to
preserve its neutral non –aligned status and enter the
Moscow-dominated Customs Union as a way “to avoid the
transformation of Ukraine into a source of raw materials for the U.S.
and Europe.”
Razumkov’s Melnyk says that Symonenko
plays by Russia’s rule book. “Symonenko’s rhetoric is one hundred
percent similar to that Russian anti-American and anti-Western
hysteria that nourishes separatist mood among pro-Russian
Ukrainians.” He said joining Customs Union would deepen economic
crisis in Ukraine.
Kyiv Post staff writer NataliyaTrach
can be reached at [email protected]
