SEVASTOPOL, CRIMEA – On Ukraine's Independence Day, the number of national flags finally became as numerous as the Russian tricolors flying over the buildings occupied by the Russian Black Sea Fleet.
The fleet
posesses 140 various buildings covering 3,300 hectares of the city’s area and
most of the ports, and will remain there until 2042 minimum under an agreement
extended by President Viktor Yanukovych in the early days of his presidency.
The other
hint that the nation was celebrating its 21st independent
anniversary were billboards of the Party of the Regions, generously scattered
all over to congratulate the residents on the day.
Nothing
else distinguished Sevastopol among southern seaports on a summer day. Tourists
strolled along the embankment, and joined the locals in swimming and sunbathing
by the famous monument to wrecked ships.
Sevastopol
only became a part of Ukraine almost 40 years after the rest of the Crimean
peninsula, which joined the republic in 1954. The city, which hosted a secret
military base, was ruled directly from Moscow until 1991, when Ukraine gained
independence.
But even
now many of the city’s residents are former or active Russian marines and their
families. Russians make up 70 percent of the population here, according to the
latest census in 2001– the highest ratio in Ukraine.
Almost
hyperbolically, the building of Sevastopol city council and local administration
are located opposite the House of Moscow, and Russian Fleet’s sports club on
the city’s main Nakhimov square.
While
Ukraine quietly governs here, Russia silently dominates.
Volodymyr
Yatsuba, head of the Party of Regions branch here, put it this way recently: “Sevastopol is a Russian cit, whether
somebody likes it or not.”
Konstantin
Zatulin, controversial head of the Russian
Institute of CIS Countries, repeated once again during his visit to
Ukraine in July that “Sevastopol is a city of Russian pride, which
is now on Ukrainian territory.”
In the
streets, people look up in awe when they hear Ukrainian spoken. Occasionally,
somebody will even try to respond in the national language, visibly struggling.
Sevastopol was one of the first Ukrainian cities to approve the use of Russian as the regional language.
“You don’t
feel Ukraine here at all,” says Serhiy Repkov, a Sevastopol-born 31-year-old
programmer. He added that many locals have both Ukrainian and Russian
citizenships, and most children aim to continue education in Russia.
His wife
Svitlana Buko, 31, an executive director of a research project, said that when
she first arrived from Russia in 2003, she tried to find Ukrainian language
courses, but failed. “All were looking at me as I was crazy,” she said.
Buko
believes it would be easy to get young Ukrainian language teachers from western
Ukraine to Sevastopol, who could have a great time in the southern city and
teach the locals at the same time. “Why has nobody even tried for all these 20
years?” she exclaimed.
The only
Ukrainian school in Sevastopol was closed in April because of poor
infrastructure and lack of pupils, while construction of a new Ukrainian school
was suspended over lack of financing.
The
language law which gives Russian more of an official status was hailed in the
city despite the fact that it could not make much difference anyway.
The Buko
and Repkov family say that Sevastopol’s dislike of all things Ukrainian is
basically a myth. As if to prove their point, a crowd of close to 1,000 people
that gathered on the Nakhimov square for
an Independence Day concert, watched traditional Ukrainian dance, hopak,
with fascination.
“Its’ so
nice,” one woman exclaimed.
Repkov said
no authorities have ever made a real attempt to bring the Ukrainian culture and
language to Sevastopol.
“It doesn’t
matter what political force is in power, pro-Ukrainian or not, nothing has been
ever done for the Ukrainian language here,” Repkov says.
