Kharkiv: all bets are off regarding winners (03/29/98)

GAUGING THE MOOD OF UKRAINE'S VOTERS

ON THE EVE OF ELECTIONS

Kharkiv: all bets are off regarding winners

by Yarema A. Bachynsky
Special to The Ukrainian Weekly

KHARKIV - All bets are off as to who will take this city of 1.5 million, the first capital of Soviet Ukraine and at one-time an industrial powerhouse, in the upcoming elections to the Verkhovna Rada and local councils. Although there is a stable and large base of support for Communists and other parties of the left, centrists look to take a considerable piece of the Kharkiv pie, and the right's share of the vote is unpredictable.

A walk along the city's streets indicates that the Liberal Party - Labor Party Together! bloc of Volodymyr Scherban and Valentyn Landyk and the Social Democratic Party - United (headed by the former president, Leonid Kravchuk, and includes a former prime minister, Yevhen Marchuk) have spent considerable sums of money on posters and other street "agitprop" materials. Both parties have also filled the airwaves with television and radio announcements.

The National Democratic Party is well-advertised and should grab a piece of the centrist vote owing to the large number of government officials connected to it, while some of Kharkiv's youth, generally apathetic to voting, will choose the Green Party, which has blasted the city with television ad after television ad.

The SLON (Socialist - Liberal Organization) bloc, headed by Volodymyr Hryniov, closely allied with President Leonid Kuchma, has also taken to the airwaves, claiming the mantle of "protector of the Russian language and culture," a slogan that may indeed play well in overwhelmingly Russian-speaking Kharkiv. This party has tailor-made television announcements in a "man on the street" format, with some people claiming that a vote for SLON is the last hope for ethnic Russians in Ukraine.

The left has gone partly underground, with no television advertising, but with more than a few old "babuli" distributing leaflets urging locals to vote for the Communists and a renewed Soviet Union. Most residents with whom this reporter spoke, whether planning to vote for the left or not, agreed that Oleksander Moroz and Petro Symonenko will get their chunk of the vote and cannot do much to increase their share in any case.

Rukh has devoted some attention to Kharkiv, with a number of visits by Viacheslav Chornovil and other national party figures over the past several months, and at least some local organizational strength as exhibited by the fact that every third lamppost in the city center is covered with Rukh posters.

A dark horse in both municipal and Verkhovna Rada elections here is the Ukrainian National Assembly (UNA), which has fielded candidates in 30 of 70-odd City Council districts. The UNA's oblast leader, Oles Babii is running against former Defense Minister Valerii Shmarov in a single-mandate Verkhovna Rada district. It promises to be a hot race.

All in all, Kharkiv is a mixed bag, as seen from the following voices of its residents.

Andriy Dudenko, 33, engineer: "I will vote for Marchuk and the Social Democrats - United because I think we need centrist-oriented people with experience in government. Perhaps if the Parliament were more centrist and the Communists had less dead wood there, the president would be able to get reforms through."
Alla Frolova, 58, pensioner: "The Communists, of course. What have the democrats, and Rukh, and Kuchma given me? Forty-nine rubles [sic] a month and no health care. Why should I support them? And I want us to be closer to Russia, which the Communists will do."
Serhii Balakin, 44, unemployed welder: "I will vote for the Socialists. They can be trusted to help get our country out of the mess we are in now. I used to work at the Malyshev [Tank] Plant; now I can't get a job and have to drive people like you [interview was done in a car] around town. I think we need people who know how to take care of us, like it was before Gorbachev came around."
Valentyna Shamalieva, 63, pensioner: "I don't believe anyone can do anything here anymore. But I will vote for the Communists. We once had a great country, now we have a trash dump. But I don't know if even Sereda [a local Verkhovna Rada candidate from the left] and people like him can do anything with this mafia that runs our country today."
Ihor Rymchuk, 21, student: "I will go out on Sunday and vote for the UNA. They are the only party that has not sold out to Moscow or the West. Ukraine can climb out of this mess only by relying on its own people and restoring order."
Svitlana Olesko, 24, playwright: "I am planning to vote for Rukh because they have a proven record of supporting Ukrainian language and culture, and because they can lead our country out of the present crisis. But my vote alone is not much and who knows how many like me there are in Kharkiv?"
Kostiantyn Kaliakin, 51, professor: "I don't know exactly who I will vote for, but vote I will. Probably the Liberals, maybe Pynzenyk's party (Reform and Order). If they were in charge, I would have my salary on time and my students would not be taking lessons in a lecture hall that is literally crumbling."
Kolia Semenko, 48, taxi driver: "The elections are all bought ahead of time - you know that. It doesn't matter if I vote or not, the people who are closest to power will stay in power. Of course, if I do go and vote, I will vote for Hryniov and SLON. We used to be together with Russia. My wife is Russian and my daughter just failed a university entrance exam because it was in Ukrainian. I don't think it's right to force us Russian speakers to use Ukrainian. Why stir things up with Russia?"