Verkhovna Rada withdraws provision for parliamentary election of president (02/08/04)

Verkhovna Rada withdraws provision for parliamentary election of president

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Ukraine's Verkhovna Rada retreated on January 3 from an initiative to give itself the authority to elect the president on behalf of the nation and amended a draft bill on political reform that had come under intense European criticism.

"In 2004 and thereafter, Ukraine's president will be elected to a five-year term by a nationwide vote," explained Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Volodymyr Lytvyn during a lull after presiding over a short but stormy extraordinary session of Ukraine's Parliament.

Responding to a critical evaluation by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) - which had questioned the validity of amending the Constitution of Ukraine to change the powers of the president and the Parliament during a presidential election year and, also, the way in which the bill passed its initial reading - the Parliament voted to retain the stipulation in the Constitution that the president must be elected by direct popular vote.

The approval of the first reading of the bill, which would have given the Parliament the right to elect the president and appoint the prime minister, produced an outcry from opposition forces in the country when it was passed on December 24, 2003, by a hand vote - a method of voting unforeseen either in the Constitution or the procedural rules of the Verkhovna Rada.

Opposition factions in the Verkhovna Rada, led by the Our Ukraine coalition, which called the manner in which the first vote took place "a constitutional coup d'état" and had strenuously fought against transferring the right to elect the president to the Parliament, nonetheless protested the latest parliamentary vote - what should have been a political victory for them - on the grounds that it was procedurally illegal.

In a confusing series of events that marked a chaotic day, the Our Ukraine faction and the Yulia Tymoshenko faction, two of the four parliamentary factions that are in opposition to the Kuchma administration, refused to take part in the vote because, in their estimation, it was simply an amendment to the December 24, 2003, bill, which they assert was passed illegally - a notion supported by a PACE resolution from January 29.

"PACE said that the vote of December 24 didn't happen, this is the gist of the problem. We should have begun from point zero," explained National Deputy Yurii Kostenko, chairman of the National Party and a leader of the Our Ukraine coalition.

Speaking in a separate interview, Our Ukraine coalition leader Viktor Yushchenko added: "The danger is that when the process is carried out illegally, the content becomes illegal as well."

The day was to have begun as the opening of the fifth session of the current convocation of the Parliament. However, Chairman Lytvyn shocked many onlookers and riled the opposition forces when he announced that within the hour he would open an extraordinary session of the Parliament under authority given him in Article 83 of the Constitution.

Sixty minutes later he reappeared and formally announced that a special vote would take place on draft law 4105, the political reform bill. As Our Ukraine lawmakers rushed the rostrum - one shoved a large bound copy of the Constitution into Mr. Lytvyn's chest while others threw paper and whatever else was at hand, including the contents of a soda pop container his way - the chairman called for the playing of the national anthem to open the session.

Then, as the chaos continued, he read aloud the change to the draft law and then called for a vote, receiving 304 aye votes to pass the measure. Within minutes one account has it that it took seven minutes in all - the extraordinary session was closed and an announcement made that the regular opening of the Fifth Session would take place later that day.

Afterwards, Stefan Havrysh, a member of the pro-presidential majority and an author of the political reform bill, said the amendments that were approved were those that had been agreed upon between the opposition factions and the pro-reform factions in a special meeting with President Leonid Kuchma on February 2.

"After it became evident that the opposition would not live up to its part in the deal, we decided to open a special session to approve the compromised draft bill anyway," explained Mr. Havrysh. "We also showed that we have sufficient votes for the two-thirds needed to finish the process [of constitutional change]."

The Socialist Party, formerly a bedrock within the opposition, threw 17 of its 20 votes behind the amendment, and gave the draft bill the two-thirds minimum - 300 votes - that it would need in the final vote to amend the Constitution. More importantly, the sea change may have dealt the final blow to an opposition force that had been slowly falling apart since the summer, when Socialist Party leader Oleksander Moroz and Communist Party leader Petro Symonenko had agreed to talks with President Kuchma to try to resuscitate a previous political reform package that had died in Parliament.

Most lawmakers acknowledged that President Kuchma and Mr. Moroz had met late on February 3 to strike a deal in which the Socialist leader agreed that his forces would support the bill and the president pledged that he would not waiver from an agreement to hold presidential elections by popular vote.

Mr. Moroz's first assistant, Socialist party Vice-Chairman Josyf Vinskii, speaking on Ukrainian television the evening after the hectic day, said he had no information about a meeting between Messrs. Moroz and Kuchma the previous evening. He explained that the decision to support the amendments to draft bill 4105 was agreed upon by the Socialist faction in caucus.

"We wanted to ensure that presidential elections would occur," explained Mr. Vinskii on Channel 5 Television. "We also wanted to save the concept of political reform."

Among the three Socialist faction members who refused to support the bill was National Deputy Yurii Lutsenko, who gained renown - and a seat in the Parliament - by his organization of the Ukraine Without Kuchma demonstrations in 2001. Mr. Lutsenko said that, while he understood that the bill was a good effort at compromise, he questioned why compromise was needed at all.

Meanwhile, Our Ukraine National Deputy Borys Bespalii questioned the procedural and Constitutional legality of Mr. Lytvyn's decision to call an extraordinary session of Parliament. He explained that no unusual circumstances were evident at the time the decision was announced and that, in any case, it was up to the legislative body or the president to make such a call.

"The procedure for opening an extraordinary session is that it should either be initiated by a vote of at least 150 national deputies or called by the president," explained Mr. Bespalii.

The Our Ukraine lawmaker added that he believes the reason for calling the special session was to make sure that the constitutional amendments called for in the political reform bill were approved prior to the October presidential elections.

He explained that in accordance with the Constitution the bill needed to be approved in two separate but consecutive sessions, first by a majority vote and then by a two-thirds vote. Mr. Bespalii noted that because PACE had basically de-legitimized the vote of December 24, 2003, the bill with the appropriate amendment was returned to the parliamentary floor for approval in an extraordinary session so that the final vote could take place during the fifth session.

The resolution passed by PACE, which was adopted after heated debate among representatives of the various European Parliaments on January 29 during a special session on the "political crisis in Ukraine," stated that it was "deeply troubled by the recent developments in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine." (For the full text of the PACE resolution see page 10.)

The PACE resolution warned that any constitutional reforms taken on the eve of presidential elections would be "biased and divisive," and said it therefore considered the initiative ill-timed. It noted that the draft proposals on political reform were voted upon without serious consideration and debate, which should have included, "proper public information and a nationwide discussion of the issues." PACE also criticized the tactics used by the opposition to paralyze the work of the Parliament.

The resolution further criticized the Constitutional Court of Ukraine for its recent rulings. It called on President Kuchma to allow PACE to review his nominees for the Central Election Committee.

Finally, PACE stated that a vote by hands is not recognized in the Verkhovna Rada Rules of Procedure, which meant that the Parliamentary Assembly also did not recognize the vote. Furthermore, it called for the appointment of a special representative in Ukraine to monitor current political developments and provide advice to PACE.

The PACE resolution threatened Ukraine with sanctions and, ultimately, suspension of membership if it should continue to press ahead with constitutional reform outside proscribed procedures or if it should be determined that the upcoming October presidential elections were not free and fair.

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