With the Ukrainian presidential election imminent and an unexpected political newcomer consolidating his lead in the polls, it is time to face up to realities and address the causes and implications of the current political earthquake that Ukraine is experiencing.
As the mudslinging and recriminations culminate, what needs to be considered are not only the problems which this unsavory battle has highlighted, but also the challenges and new opportunities which the shifting of the country’s political tectonic plates brings.
Whoever wins the presidential election still has to secure enough support in the parliamentary election in October if they are to become an effective leader. It is that forthcoming period of intense wheeling and dealing when a realignment of political forces occurs that new a new window of opportunity for Ukraine should open. But much depends on what happens now and how the victor is received.
On the positive side, the presidential election has demonstrated that democracy in Ukraine, despite the enduring pervasive influence of the oligarchic establishment and, moreover, at a time of war, is alive if not entirely healthy. Despite the usual manipulation and dirty tricks, the competition has been real and its outcome unpredictable.
Stock has been taken of where things stand after the EuroMaidan Revolution that ended President Viktor Yanukovych’s rule in 2014, triggering Russia’s invasion and dismemberment of 7 percent of Ukrainian territory with the seizure of Crimea and parts of the eastern Donbas. The record of five years of President Petro Poroshenko’s administration has been weighed up. Is change needed or should there be more of the same? The verdict is about to be delivered.
Significantly, this question has revolved around how the country has been managed, and not about the direction it has been moving since embarking on its European trajectory. The majority of the candidates who have entered the presidential race support Ukraine’s European orientation and integration into-Euro-Atlantic structures and need for further democratic reforms.
The pro-Russian forces formerly united in the Party of the Regions have split, are weaker and for the moment marginalized. The far right and ultra-nationalists, while continuing periodically to make themselves heard, have not managed to attract additional support to enhance their chances in the elections.
What is clear is that the degree of dissatisfaction with Poroshenko’s running of the country has surprised even the most seasoned pundits. Despite his capable representation of himself as a war leader and of Ukraine to the outside world, his identification with the oligarchic system, half-hearted approach to reform, and perception as an obstacle to eradicating corruption and establishing and independent and credible legal system, have exposed him to serious and persistent charges of misrule. Even those who defend him out of “Ukrainian patriotism,” acknowledge in private that this is not out of enthusiasm but as a ‘lesser evil.”
Poroshenko’s main rival and front runner in the polls until recently, the veteran Pasionaria of Ukrainian politics Yulia Tymoshenko managed during the last two years or so to reinvent herself and her Batkivschyna family and to offer a serious alternative. Her populism notwithstanding, she and her team made the most serious effort of all the candidates to develop publicly and with the help of experts a comprehensive reform strategy.
Also encouraging is that another serious candidate, former defense minister Anatoly Hrytsenko, managed to persuade several other politicians, including the mayor of Lviv and head of the Sampomich Party, Andriy Sadovy, to rally around him and form the nucleus of a potential new democratic political party.
But the real surprise was the appearance as potential candidates of two younger and very different newcomers, both every popular in their own right – the rock singer Sviatoslav Vakarchuk, who performs in Ukrainian, and the actor and comedian Volodymyr Zelenskiy, a Russophone who has plays a crusading reformer in a TV show. Vakarchuk eventually decided to bide his time and not to run, opening the way for Zelenskiy to surge forward.
For the first time since the former dissidents ran for president in 1991 in the first election after independence, a strong candidate with a very real chance of winning has emerged from outside the system. This, and his relatively young age and approach, makes the appearance of Zelenskiy on the political scene a refreshing and exciting, if controversial, phenomenon.
Initially a joker in the pack, Zelenskiy represents a massive protest vote and call for change. At this late stage though he has neither elaborated his vision, let alone program, nor unveiled his team, fueling suspicion, disdain and even alarm in some quarters. His links with the billionaire oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky are also a source of concern.
On the negative side, the election has once again revealed issues reflecting both institutional shortcomings and those related to the level of political culture. Presumably, if there is change at the top, there will be pressure to review the electoral system. But changing political culture will be a more difficult and longer process.
It is ironic, for example, that Ukrainian specialists and volunteers who have become so good at fighting Russian fake news, have not really addressed the issue of the fabrications, distortion and confusion that have become tacitly accepted as a normal feature of electioneering. Indeed, civil society so vibrant four or five years ago, has hardly been taken seriously by any of the candidates.
More worrying still is the way that opposing side are demonizing their rivals, implicitly ruling out cooperation and thereby promoting alienation and polarization. The president of the European Council Donald Tusk wisely cautioned Ukrainians during his historic speech in the Ukrainian parliament in February to avoid generating bitter internal conflict during the upcoming elections. “Argue in moderation,” he advised, “and remain united on those matters that are the most important for Ukraine.”
The response to Zelenskiy shows how shortsighted and dangerous this is. His detractors, who include numerous prominent Ukrainian cultural and intellectual figures, not only dismiss the self-made millionaire actor who has a law degree as a “clown,” but also target him as a “Russophone” suggesting that his loyalty to Ukraine is suspect. They ignore that he is taking votes away from Russophone Ukrainians and ethnic Russians who would otherwise be tempted to back pro-Russian candidates.
If Zelenskiy does win, understanding and cooperation will be needed to avoid splitting the country into the Ukrainian-speaking west and Russophone south and east and undoing the impetus given by the EuroMaidan Revolution and defense of eastern Ukraine to forging a modern political nation.
After the presidential election,while safeguarding national unity and security, the key challenges will be,to restore public and external confidence, and reconfigure politics allowing for the election of a credible and effective parliament.
