PERSPECTIVES: And the winner is ... (10/10/99)

PERSPECTIVES

by Andrew Fedynsky

And the winner is ...

The 1999 presidential election in Ukraine began tragically when Rukh Party leader Vyacheslav Chornovil died in an auto accident during a late-night campaign trip on March 26. Nearly 35 years ago, in 1965, Chornovil was a young television journalist who did something incredibly brave - many would say foolhardy.

He reported the truth about the trials of 20 Ukrainian intellectuals who had been arrested by the KGB for speaking out in defense of Ukrainian culture - something they had every right to do under the Constitution of the USSR. Before long, Chornovil was also behind bars, and for the next 20 years he spent a good part of his life in prisons and labor camps.

He never gave up his vision, though, and in 1991 he ran for president of newly independent Ukraine, coming in second with 22 percent of the vote. His supporters were looking to him in the 1999 campaign to hold the line on Ukrainian sovereignty, culture and language.

For a lot of Ukrainians, these questions of statecraft are the most important issues for their country, particularly since former Communists have been tapping into nostalgia for the Soviet Union, calling for closer ties with Russia. No politician has been more outspoken about restoring some kind of Ukraine-Russia union than Oleksander Tkachenko, chairman of the Verkhovna Rada and a candidate for President.

Messrs. Tkachenko and Chornovil were born two years apart - but they were light years apart politically.

In 1967, when the KGB arrested Mr. Chornovil for the first time, Mr. Tkachenko was in his second year as first secretary of the Young Communist League (Komsomol) in his district. In 1985 he became minister of agriculture of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Mr. Chornovil was in jail, again.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, both men wound up in the Verkhovna Rada as leaders of their respective political blocs. Soon after he became chairman of the Rada a year ago in July, Mr. Tkachenko caused a furor with his Independence Day speech, in which he praised the 70-plus years of Soviet rule in Ukraine and called for closer ties with Russia. In December Mr. Tkachenko went to Moscow to meet with Gennadii Selezniov, chairman of the Russian Duma. There, both parliamentary leaders pledged to work for a Russia-Ukraine-Belarus Union, something Mr. Tkachenko said is a "necessity" for Ukraine and the other two Slavic countries.

Well, politics never lacks for surprises, and I for one was amazed when Mr. Tkachenko joined three other presidential candidates at the grave of Taras Shevchenko on August 24, Ukraine's Independence Day, to unite behind a single candidate (they didn't say which one, but never mind) in the campaign against front-running incumbent Leonid Kuchma. Surrounded by blue-and-yellow flags and steeped in the spirit of Ukraine's national poet, the leader of Ukraine's Socialist Party, Oleksander Moroz; the mayor of Cherkassy Volodymyr Oliinyk; a former head of the Soviet Ukrainian KGB, Yevhen Marchuk; and Mr. Tkachenko denounced President Kuchma for "losing Ukraine's sovereignty."

With an appeal to the patriotism of Ukrainians, they offered their leadership to steer Ukraine out of its economic mess. The four candidates all come from a Communist background, but the word "socialism" was never used.

I looked at all of this - the grave of Shevchenko, Independence Day, the flags, embroidered cloths, the patriotic statements, the retreat from socialism - and said, "Wow! What happened to Oleksander Tkachenko?" Here he is blasting President Kuchma for not doing enough to protect Ukraine's sovereignty. What's going on? The main apologist for Soviet rule in Ukraine, the man who yearned for a restored Russian-Ukrainian union is now invoking Shevchenko and campaigning as a defender of Ukraine's statehood. A cynic looking at all of this might quote Samuel Johnson about patriotism being the last refuge of a scoundrel. I'm inclined to be more charitable and give Chairman Tkachenko the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he read my column from last year, where I reminded him of Stalin and the Great Famine and blasted him for his Independence Day speech.

Acutally, I doubt if Mr. Tkachenko reads my column. It's more likely that he reads Ukraine's electorate. For 70 years, during the Soviet era that Mr. Tkachenko was defending so ardently a year ago, Ukrainians had two choices on every ballot: the Communist Party or Siberia. The Communists won every election with a 99 percent majority: surprise, surprise ... Only a fool would choose Siberia; or a hero like Chornovil.

The first time that Ukrainians were offered a real choice was on the independence referendum in 1991 when more than 90 percent of the people voted to break with Moscow - almost the exact reverse of how they voted when the only choice was communism. Now that vote was a surprise, particularly since 25 percent of Ukraine's population is ethnically Russian but, as I said, politics - and history - are full of surprises.

The election of the president of Ukraine is a month away, and with 15 candidates, Ukrainians have plenty of choices. Mr. Tkachenko is far down in the polls that I've seen, and President Kuchma is still out in front. Based on what took place in Kaniv, though, I think we can already declare a winner in the race: Vyacheslav Chornovil. He took on a challenge in 1965 and didn't give up until the empire that put him in prison collapsed under the weight of all its lies and crimes. History will show that Chornovil was a leader, a man with an instinctive feel for where his people wanted to go. What is more, he had the courage to get out in front of the independence issue at a time when the only reward for doing so was years of prison and hard labor.

As for Oleksander Tkachenko, a superb politician, a guy who rose through the ranks of the Communist Party and then, when the Soviet Union collapsed, landed on his feet to become chairman of his country's Parliament. Now he's learning to play the political game with different rules, just like every other politician in Ukraine. Today, Ukraine is a democracy, and public opinion counts. The country is conducting an orderly, democratic presidential election campaign and the views of voters are obviously swaying the public positions of the candidates. With Russia up to its eyeballs in financial scandal, war in Daghestan, terrorism in Moscow and questionable leadership, reunion with Russia is a loser politically for most Ukrainians. So with a finger in air to test the wind, Mr. Tkachenko and his three partners invoke the spirit of Shevchenko and announce their readiness to lead Ukraine by following the electorate behind the blue-and-yellow flag.

No one knows what's in Mr. Tkachenko's head or in his heart. By surrounding himself with patriotic symbols and positioning himself as a defender of Ukraine's sovereignty, Mr. Tkachenko and the constituency he represents have obviously moved away from Lenin and a lot closer to Chornovil. That's a big step in the right direction. If only he'd do something to privatize Ukraine's agricultural sector. Now that would be progress.

| Home Page |