A
legislative regulation of opposition rights and obligations (through a number
of Verkhovna Rada committees) could substantially improve the political balance
in Ukraine and prevent the monopolization of power by any one political party.
In Ukraine, as compared
to Great Britain for example, the leader of the opposition party or coalition
has no official status, obligations or duties.
They are not obliged by
law to develop and promote alternative policies. This means that the legal
status of the Ukrainian opposition does not involve obligation to develop
political and administrative alternatives, making it a practically useless
element in terms of governance and state regulation. This appears to be one of
major obstacles to the establishment of a cohesive political field and general
accountability of both government and opposition. At the same time the
situation fosters conditions for the development of empty populism within the
opposition. Under Ukrainian legislation opposition have zero obligations and
can throw as many populist promises around as they like.
As in many other
countries in transition, after having declared democracy following a period of
authoritarian rule, Ukraine’s opposition is devoid of the abilities and
instruments of influence (aside from parliament) to participate meaningfully in
the political dialectic. Faced with their own impotence the opposition opts for
either invisibility or radicalism in the extreme. They either strive to replace
those in government completely or divide lesser governing positions and
resources amongst government members and themselves. They totally disregard the
development of alternative solutions and national development strategies for
both the whole country and separate fields, such as internal and foreign
policies, health, education and the economy.(1) By reducing parliamentary competition down to a
primitive contest for national resources, instead of suggesting new development
programmes for Ukraine and strategic plans of their implementation, the
opposition is failing to fulfil its most basic function and thereby damages
everyone – the government, the people and themselves.
Disunity
of the opposition forces remains one of the major problems. One of reasons for
this is that the Ukrainian political system involves excessively numerous
political parties.
There
are always big parties outside the governing coalition with their own vision
and ambitions for the development of the country but it is very difficult for
them to agree terms with other opposition parties, thereby leaving the smaller
parties to barter their way into power.
Most
recent example is ‘United Opposition’ – a coalition of ‘Batkivschyna’, ‘Front
Zmin’, ‘Gromadianska platforma’ and others.
Ukrainian
experts note the numerous conflicts between Batkivschyna and Front Zmin in many
regions, the reason being that Arseniy Yatseniuk, leader of Front Zmin, is more
actively promoting his own candidates to the party list for parliamentary
elections, whilst also trying to attract part of the Batkivschyna electorate. One
has to ask why or perhaps it has something to do with how his party is funded?
Ukrainian
society faces a problem – the opposition have neither will nor power to
professionally and effectively criticise the government’s actions, recognise
their mistakes and suggest ways to correct them, secure parliamentary and
social control of the government’s actions, mobilise society in case democratic
norms and rights are violated, etc. Thus the opposition has no control over the
regime, leading to utter instability in the social and political arenas of
Ukraine.
In the context of the
upcoming parliamentary elections the lack of effective control over the
government’s actions by the opposition, the many populist promises and the
general inaction of many opposition politicians convinces the people of Ukraine
that current opposition is very much made in the same mold as the regime. It is
no surprise that sociologists have noticed a decrease of the level of support
for the opposition after Tymoshenko was excluded from the United Opposition
list as she was one of the few rallying points for real opposition.
At the moment sympathies
are divided as follows: 25 percent for the Party of Regions, 20-15 percent for
the United Opposition, 12-14 percent for Vitali Klitschko’s Ukrainian
Democratic Alliance for Reform and 7-9 percent for the Communist Party of
Ukraine.
The nationalist Svoboda Party
and Ukraine-Forward’s Party with Natalia Korolevska are on the edge of
overcoming the 5 percent barrier.
Few
Ukrainians believe that the present opposition can become a legitimate and
constructive alternative to the current government.
A
group of activists has even initiated a campaign called “referendum on Ukraine
joining the USA” on Facebook; they hope to collect three million signatures in
support. Many Ukrainian people want to earn respect, freedom, properly paid
jobs, social security and everything they do not have in contemporary Ukraine, but
few see the opposition as their road to salvation.
Despite
general frustration and difficult circumstances, including various type of
pressure by the government, the current Ukrainian opposition still have a
chance to earn back the trust of the people and start fulfilling, at least
partially, their responsibility to check and balance the government.
To
start with, all opposition political parties must consolidate their efforts, to
prevent large scale election fraud during the parliamentary elections on Oct.
28. Afterwards they should unite all opposition forces within a new democratic
parliament. If this does not happen, we will have every reason to say that the
current Ukrainian opposition are just clones of the government in power, which
are intentionally undermining the democratic development of Ukraine.
People First Comment: The only real
opposition to the current regime is in jail, all the rest is just a highly predictable
mess of money, self-interest and the desire for power but frankly what more should
we expect when all those running for election have little understanding of how
democratic government works or even the role that democracy should play within
the political system. In reality, Ukraine
does not have a political system as the very framework of rules and legislation
have been overturned so many times that nobody really understands how they
should work let alone how they do work in practice. So how has Ukraine reached this impossible
situation? Why is it that a majority of people no longer believe any of the
parties? Why do many distrust the
sociologists?
First the parties or clans have names that are not backed by any form of
political ideology. The communists are
not communist, the socialists are not socialist and the Christian democrats are
neither Christian nor democratic. This
total lack of political ideology means that the only thing they have to offer
are personalities and populism and the biggest personality of all is currently
behind bars.
Couple the lack of ideology with the lack of a legal requirement to
develop alternative policies and the end result is obvious. You only have to look at the advertising
posters to see that there is simply nothing behind the smiling faces. All the slogans would appear to have been
written by the same copywriter. They say
nothing, they offer nothing, simply because the opposition parties have no
obligation to change anything apart from who feeds at the trough. They do not
address the key concerns of the electorate and instead offer only populist
platitudes and a promise to do… something… when they get into power. The TV debates are equally pathetic combining
rhetoric with insults rather than dealing, even amateurly, with the real issue
of the day.
One would have expected that the rump of Tymoshenko’s party Batkivschyna with all
their experience in power and their visits to Brussels to have recognised the
need for well thought out plans and national strategies. But even Yulia
believed that a national political manifesto could be written on one sheet of
A4 paper.
One might
consider that Klitschko, with all his international experience, would be able
to offer more substance but alas he too seems to have fallen into the populist
trap. The Communist Party would seem to be the most amusing of all.
For the past year and a half, they have sided with the
regime voting almost without exception for the regime’s legislation. Yet today
their slogans hark back to 1917, even offering to give the land and the
factories back to the workers. Has
nobody told them that 20 years ago, 92 percent of the nation voted for exactly
that and today, in the democratic state of Ukraine the land and the factories
are not theirs to give back.
What is interesting in this election however is the
role of the oligarchs who rather than simply backing the regime are hedging
their bets backing all sorts of candidates in a full spectrum of parties such
as Natalia Korolevska who, not content with her own smiling face, has recruited
the patriotism of football star Andriy Shevchenko, even though he has already
admitted that he and his family are moving to the United States.
The statistics are beginning to show that the
opposition parties could well win a large enough percentage to win the election
and oust Party of Regions therefore one has to ask if: a) the Oligarchs are
seeking to support the governing party by backing patsy candidates in a bid to
take votes away from real opposition candidates or b) trying to get their
people in place who will cross the floor as independents and join the regime or
c) they are worried about the impact of the regime’s vertical power structure
on their business interests and want to clip the President’s wings.
In reality this country does not have a functioning
political system that can be taken seriously.
None of the parties are interested in the long term future of the nation
or of the people. This election is
simply a bid for power and access to the state budget. Where Ukraine goes after this is anybody’s
guess.
Victor Tkachuk is chief executive officer of the Kyiv-based People
First Foundation (www.peoplefirst.org.ua), a former deputy secretary of
the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, adviser to three
Ukrainian presidents and a former parliament member, Tkachuk can be
reached via [email protected].
