KP Media, photo by Oleksiy Boyko“Now Ukraine’s economy and politics largely depend on what side of the bed the prime minister gets up from,” the popular newsmagazine wrote in its Aug. 22 edition. “The most active mechanisms of influence on the country are accumulated in her hands, not in the hands of a distrusted president.”
Tymoshenko’s resurgence came after a remarkable comeback last fall when she returned as prime minister following her party’s strong showing in a snap parliament election. In regaining the premiership she held briefly in 2005, Tymoshenko thrust aside the government led by Victor Yanukovych, whose path to the presidency through a rigged election was blocked by the 2004 democratic Orange Revolution.
She is now wellpositioned for the presidential election scheduled for 2010.
Yanukovych fell from first place to sixth in this year’s ranking, behind Rinat Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest tycoon and fellow Party of Regions member.
President Victor Yushchenko, Tymoshenko’s Orange Revolution ally and now her political foe, serves as the country’s leader on paper, but trails in the ranking at third.
Yushchenko’s consummate political chief of staff, Victor Baloha, follows in fourth place. Baloha is just ahead of billionaire Victor Pinchuk, the soninlaw of exPresident Leonid Kuchma, who is now in the last spot.
For the most part, however, the top 100 list is made up of the same old faces that have ruled Ukraine for years, only in different order.
This is the sixth such ranking created by Korrespondent, created with the help of an advisory board that included economists, political analysts and other experts. Their findings produced a few newcomers, but 75 percent of the list includes the same individuals as last year.
Referring to Akhmetov, in the No. 2 spot with an unrivaled fortune of $31.1 billion, Korrespondent wrote: “The businessman operates the three most efficient instruments of influence: money, big money and very big money.”
Akhmetov is followed in the rankings by about 29 billionaires and millionaires, who frequently combine their business activity with public service.
Outside of the usual movers and shakers, this year’s ranking includes 25 newcomers, some of whom have reappeared on the list.
Hryhoriy Nemyria, vice prime minister in charge of European integration, is one of Tymoshenko’s confidants and shot up to the 25th spot. He arrived in politics only a few years ago after an academic career and years of activity in civic society initiatives, helping him develop close ties to Brussels and diplomats in Ukraine.
Three of the most influential are foreigners, including television host Savik Shuster, Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov and American Gene Van Dyke, owner of Houstonbased gas and oil exploration company Vanco Energy.
Shuster’s weekly political talk show is one of the mostwatched Ukrainian programs and serves as a boxing ring for the country’s politicians.
Political analyst Kost Bondarenko said Luzhkov and Van Dyke were big newsmakers in 2008.
Luzhkov has led a push by Russia challenging Ukraine’s territorial claims to the Crimean Peninsula, where Russia’s Black Sea Fleet is based until a lease expires in 2017.
Van Dyke’s Vanco Energy secured a massive hydrocarbon oil and gas exploration and production project off the Crimean coast. Yushchenko has defended the project, which is partially backed by Akhmetov. But Tymoshenko is challenging it on grounds that the investors had been awarded too large of a field. She also suspects the investors are tied to Russian energy giant Gazprom.
Only 10 women made the ranking, including Yushchenko’s wife Kateryna (29), Yanukovych confidant Raisa Bogateriova (9) and wellknown writer Oksana Zabuzhko (72). Pinchuk’s wife, Olena Franchuk, ranked 83, a bit above Kuchma, her father and Ukraine’s expresident.
“There are obviously few new faces, especially, among young politicians,” said Vasyl Yurchyshyn, director of economic programs at Razumkov Center for Political and Economic Studies, who has contributed to Korrespondent’s assessment. “Therefore, we can hardly expect changes in [the country’s stormy] politics. Most likely, the situation will repeat, with dominating politicians merely exchanging places.
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