You're reading: Yanukovych starts off by stirring up fears that he will be a ‘Moscow Project’ as president

Critics say he cannot push his agenda without making key concessions.

For his detractors, like President Victor Yushchenko, who view Victor Yanukovych as a “Moscow Project,” the president-elect gave plenty of reason for worry in the first days after his Feb. 7 election.

In a slew of interviews with Russian journalists, Yanukovych promised to consider allowing Russia’s Black Sea Fleet to remain stationed on Ukrainian territory in Sevastopol after the current lease expires in 2017. He even said he would consider another military base by whoever is willing to pay rent. This prospect alarms many in Ukraine who do not want a foreign military force based on the nation’s sovereign territory.

Yanukovych said Ukraine would not enter NATO, an all-but-dead prospect that still brings dread to the Kremlin for the Cold War memories the Western military alliance conjures up.

The president-elect also has pledged to push for legislation allowing more widespread use of the Russian language in public life, a prospect that bothers Ukrainians who equate greater use of the Ukrainian language with strengthening national independence.

Moreover, he called for a consortium among Ukraine, Russia and the European Union to run Ukraine’s natural gas pipeline system – a vital link for Europe. This has led some analysts to voice fears of a “Belarus scenario,” in which Russia takes ownership of a majority stake.

On these four issues alone, Yanukovych has left no doubt that the outgoing president’s explicitly pro-Western agenda will be consigned to the past. In his farewell press conference Yushchenko warned that Yanukovych will lead Ukraine away from Europe.

But the reality, Yanukovych’s aides and independent analysts say, is more complicated and less alarming.

Borys Kolesnikov, deputy leader of Yanukovych’s Party of Regions, said that the question of the Black Sea Fleet will be postponed until 2015 or 2016. Another touchy issue – Yanukovych’s earlier desire to have Ukraine recognize the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, declared after Russia beat Georgia in a brief 2008 war – Kolesnikov said is not a priority. “If there are 100 problems today then this is the 101st, or 1001st,” Kolesnikov said.

Moreover, Yanukovych’s wording on the Black Sea Fleet was vague and contained no commitments and NATO has been a dead issue for some time.

Kolesnikov also said Yanukovych is against Ukraine losing ownership of the pipelines. He stressed that the consortium is crucial to Ukraine to attract investment and to keep the trust of both the supplier – Russia – and the consumer – Europe.

Whatever Yanukovych might want to do with his presidency, he may be forced to solve pressing domestic problems ahead of all others.

Looking for clues about how he will run the nation from his campaign promises is hard. His statements were sometimes specific, sometimes vague and occasionally contradictory.

They raise more questions than they answer: How will he cut taxes and raise pensions and salaries? How will he balance relations with Russia and the European Union? What obligations does he have toward his financial backers? Will he push through the Ukraine-European Union association agreement calling for greater trade and closer ties?

Questions that could be answered with campaign platitudes will now be part of the debate over national policy in coming weeks.

Kolesnikov said Regions remains committed to the legislation raising pensions and wages signed into law late last year. He said that further loans from the International Monetary Fund should not be used to fund this, but suggested that money could be found through cuts to “superfluous” government spending on assistants, cars and offices would result in large savings. “There are 15-18 deputy ministers for every minister. … We will put an end to such waste,” said Kolesnikov.

The IMF money, Kolesnikov said, should help the economy to overcome a tough period, while helping to put it in a better position to repay the loans. Regions also sees improvements to the business climate and attracting foreign investment as a way to solving budget woes. Ukraine placed 142 out of 183 countries in the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business ranking for 2009 – citing legendary corruption, vague laws and stifling bureaucracy.

“The goal is to bring it into the top 10,” Kolesnikov said.

But analysts said Yanukovych will have to drop some of his election promises, such as raising pensions, if he is going to govern responsibly.

“The Ukrainian economy started growing in November, but the tax revenues will continue to fall for 6-12 months. He’ll have to cut his pre-election promises,” said Anders Aslund, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute in Washington. “I don’t quite understand why he has continued to talk about the rises.”

Yanukovych also has several potential impediments on the path to governing.

Constitutionally, he will have the same limited powers that hobbled Yushchenko’s presidency and that has given Ukraine effectively dual executives along with the prime minister. Those changes were all part of the compromises that ended the 2004 Orange Revolution which overturned an election rigged for Yanukovych.

Yanukovych also failed to win over 50 percent of the vote and faces deep pockets of opposition in western Ukraine.

Additionally, support from a majority of parliament in the form of a governing coalition has yet to materialize.

All of this may add up to a Yanukovych presidency that is more cautious and compromising than his campaign – and Kremlin adulation – may suggest.

“His foreign policy will be low key. He will try to pacify his supporters while not outraging those who voted against him,” said Ivan Poltavets, senior analyst at the International Center for Policy Studies.

On foreign policy, analysts predict a return to ex-President Leonid Kuchma’s approach, namely a balance between the West and Russia bound to disappoint Moscow. “Yanukovych will make lots of promises to Russia, but nothing serious will be changed,” said Andrey Ryabov, an analyst at the Moscow Carnegie Center.

The nation will know what direction Yanukovych favors when he takes a clear position on a proposed custom union with Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, a step that experts say would preclude the signing of a broad free trade agreement with the European Union.

“Trade with the EU and Russia is at the same level,” Kolesnikov said. “We need to create a model in order not to lose [either] market.”

In an article for the Wall Street Journal this week, Yanukovych wrote that Ukraine should act as a “bridge” between Russia and the West. “We should not be forced to make the false choice between the benefits of the East and those of the West,” he added.

The vacillation may stem from conflicts among Yanukovych’s backers.

Analysts say that relatively market-oriented businessmen, such as steel magnate Rinat Akhmetov, are pitched against professional bureaucrats such as Mykola Azarov, who are more pro-Russian in sympathies and style of governance. Businessmen such as Akhmetov are seen as looking toward the EU as a potential market and protection against competition from Russian business.

Another early signal in direction will come from distribution of government posts if Regions is able to form a new government.

“The Party of Regions is in favor of an understandable and pragmatic path to the EU,” said Kolesnikov, a close ally of Akhmetov. He accused the Orange leaders of talking about European integration but taking no concrete steps to achieve it. “They didn’t act in a European way. They discredited the idea of democracy,” he said. He pledged that the Party of Regions would seek to “harmonize legislation” with the EU and raise living standards to a European level in order to achieve integration.

Kyiv Post staff writers James Marson and Kateryna Grushenko can be reached at [email protected] and [email protected].