Yekhanurov approved as prime minister
Yushchenko signs pact with Yanukovych

by Zenon Zawada
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - No one braving the freezing temperatures of the "maidan," or Independence Square, last year could have imagined this outcome.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko replaced his Orange Revolution comrade Yulia Tymoshenko, but only after signing a pact with his nemesis, Viktor Yanukovych, to support her successor, Yurii Yekhanurov.

In his deal with Mr. Yanukovych, reached only 30 minutes before the September 22 vote that approved Mr. Yekhanurov as prime minister, Mr. Yushchenko agreed to end all reprivatizations, according to National Deputy Vitalii Khomutynnyk of the Party of the Regions. Many of those privatizations targeted oligarchs who enriched themselves during the Kuchma era.

After the vote, Mr. Khomutynnyk reported that the president also agreed to provide amnesty to election commission officials accused of violations.

The Verkhovna Rada gave 289 votes, more than enough, in support of the nominee, described as a non-polarizing technocrat who was born in the Yakutsk region of Siberia but spent most of his life in Ukraine.

Mr. Yekhanurov is a critical part of President Yushchenko's plan to create a pragmatic, stable government that will attempt to stabilize Ukraine's economy and convince investors that the country is a safe place to do business.

"I am convinced that only a Cabinet made up of pragmatists can work actively for the benefit of Ukraine for the next seven months," Mr. Yushchenko told the Rada on September 20.

In the irony to end all ironies, Mr. Yushchenko could not receive Ms. Tymoshenko's support but did manage to find common ground with his opponent in last year's presidential elections, Mr. Yanukovych.

Both their respective factions, the Party of the Regions and the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc, rejected Mr. Yekhanurov in the narrow September 20 vote in which the Verkhovna Rada fell three votes short of the required simple majority of 226 votes in order to approve the new prime minister.

In Ukraine's parliamentary system, a faction or bloc is a union of political parties. For example, Ms. Tymoshenko leads the Batkivshchyna Party, but also leads the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc that includes several other parties. The Party of the Regions is both a party and a faction.

In the end, it seems Mr. Yekhanurov would have won approval during the second vote on September 22 without the Party of the Regions' 50 votes.

At a meeting with 18 faction and political leaders who gathered at the Presidential Secretariat on Bankova Street on the night of September 21, Mr. Yushchenko felt he had enough votes secured, participants told Ukrainian reporters.

With his last-minute pact with Mr. Yanukovych, it's now apparent that by morning the president still wasn't confident there were enough votes.

"His grasp is very bad," said Ivan Lozowy, president of the Kyiv-based Institute of Statehood and Democracy, which is exclusively financed by Ukrainian business donations. "It's not like the U.S. Congress, where you know down to the last vote who's going to be on your side. He has a very vague idea of who's going to vote to support him."

Mr. Yushchenko made the deal with the Party of the Regions because he couldn't afford to have the Rada reject Mr. Yekhanurov a second time, Mr. Lozowy said.

"He would have been made to look very, very weak," he said. "It would have shown that he can't handle a crisis and he would have lost face in front of his main opponent, Yulia Tymoshenko."

Ms. Tymoshenko's allies immediately went on the political offensive after the vote in an effort to distinguish themselves as the true reformers.

Mykola Tomenko, former vice prime minister for humanitarian affairs, said that, in effect, former President Kuchma and Mr. Yanukovych have replaced Ms. Tymoshenko as prime minister in a political rotation.

The president's team, along ethical considerations, should cross out from its public lexicon any mention of the values of the revolutionary maidan, given that its key demands were "Kuchma and Yanukovych Out!" not "Kuchma-Yanukovych Tak!" Mr. Tomenko said.

A new era resembling the values and approaches of the Kuchma regime has begun, Mr. Tomenko said.

Before the critical vote, President Yushchenko also announced he was eliminating the position of first aide, formerly held by Oleksander Tretiakov, and converting the position of state secretary (chief of staff) into chair of the Presidential Secretariat.

Critics said both positions had prevented advisers from contacting the president.

In his September 20 speech urging the Rada to support Mr. Yekhanurov, Mr. Yushchenko acknowledged that "the authority and the image that we had is diminishing today."

He repeated his historical analogy comparing the current state of Ukraine to Germany in 1948. "After three years of occupation, there were no economic or humanitarian reforms in the country," Mr. Yushchenko said. "The nation didn't believe in anything. Only the elites got together and signed a pact for stability."

He warned that the ability of the government to ensure stability in the country was at stake. "I am convinced that today it is not Yekhanurov's fate that is at stake," Mr. Yushchenko said. "Not Yekhanurov's fate, whether or not he will be prime minister, but the fate of Parliament and the president, their ability to effectively and adequately react and to ensure stability in the country."

Using the Germany metaphor as a model, Mr. Yushchenko convinced 11 faction leaders on September 13 to sign a Declaration of Unity and Cooperation for the Sake of Ukraine's Future.

Among others things, the declaration called for ensuring the interests of the Ukrainian people as the priority for government and political leaders, increasing their wealth, as well as prohibiting the use of government positions to enhance personal or business interests.

Those factions not signing were the Communist Party, the Social Democratic Party - United and the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc.

The president referred to the declaration when concluding his address to the Rada, telling the national deputies they had one of two choices: either to continue in stagnation or to achieve progress.

In a gesture of reassurance to his traditional opponents, the president assured the Cabinet there would be no political persecutions and that he would receive their input in forming the next Cabinet.

"I stress that the Cabinet will be free of people involved in business or those who have discredited themselves, or people who are out of the context of our political agreements," Mr. Yushchenko said.

Mr. Yekhanurov's selection was a clear gesture by President Yushchenko to satisfy an investment community pressuring him to create a stable environment.

Anders Aslund, an influential Washington economic advisor, had frequently criticized Ms. Tymoshenko for ruining the nation's investment climate, particularly through reprivatization efforts.

He expressed firm support for Mr. Yekhanurov's selection, noting that he presided over the State Property Fund between September 1994 and February 1997 under the Kuchma administration, "when privatizations were normal."

However, Mr. Lozowy said it was precisely during those years that the State Property Fund became a feeding trough for corrupt oligarchs swiping Ukraine's assets at unrealistic prices.

Mr. Yekhanurov is a "Kuchmist," Mr. Lozowy charged, and such speculation was buttressed by one of his first public appearances as acting prime minister. Photographers shot Mr. Yekhanurov on September 12 in Dnipropetrovsk warmly embracing Mr. Kuchma and engaging in a ritual kiss.

When questioned at the Verkhovna Rada by National Deputy Oleh Tiahnybok of the All-Ukrainian Union Svoboda about the now infamous incident, Mr. Yekhanurov said in his defense that the kiss was a tradition initiated by former Soviet Premier Leonid Brezhnev.

Mr. Tiahnybok, a nationalist, also asked Mr. Yekhanurov about his position on lustration, the process of bringing to justice officials who colluded in totalitarian or corrupt regimes.

Mr. Yekhanurov acknowledged that he himself was a member of the Communist Party. "I am against lustration as much as I myself was a [Communist] party member, as many of you were as well," he said.

The 57-year-old Mr. Yekhanurov has been closely allied with Mr. Yushchenko ever since serving as his first vice prime minister between December 1999 and May 2001. During the Orange Revolution Mr. Yekhanurov served as Mr. Yushchenko's assistant chief of staff.

Speaking fluent Ukrainian in his speech to the Rada, Mr. Yekhanurov blamed Ukraine's problems on the populist policies of the Kuchma government.

"The main objective of the new Cabinet is stabilizing the economy and creating conditions to ensure steady development," he said.

In an apparent concession to the Yanukovych team, Mr. Yekhanurov said the new Cabinet of Ministers will have a vice prime minister for regional policy so that oblast administration chairs can communicate directly to the Cabinet.

He also said there would be no attempts to centrally control the economy, indicating that he is in line with Mr. Yushchenko's commitment to deregulated markets.

Mr. Yekhanurov said he will also look to integrating market and capital within the Single Economic Space, indicating that it's unlikely Serhii Teriokhin will return to the Cabinet as economy minister. Last month, Mr. Teriokhin declared that Ukraine was not interested in the Single Economic Space, a statement Mr. Yushchenko quickly refuted.

"We will pay special attention to developing cooperation with our closest neighbors, the Russian Federation and Poland," Mr. Yekhanurov said.

During the week, Mr. Yushchenko repeated that the last straw in his decision to fire his Cabinet of Ministers was corruption surrounding the Nikopol Ferroalloys Plant in the Dnipropetrovsk Oblast.

Mr. Yushchenko told Western journalists on September 13 that Ms. Tymoshenko's behind-the-scenes maneuvering to steer the factory into the ownership of her Dnipropetrovsk business associates resulted in a near riot.

Thousands of Nikopol workers protested the factory's new management, which was determined at an illegal shareholders meeting that was allegedly forced by Ms. Tymoshenko.

Ms. Tymoshenko has denied pressuring any judges or government officials to hold an illegal shareholders meeting of Nikopol.

It is now known that the plant's owner, Viktor Pinchuk, created the atmosphere for the riot-like situation. Not only was he present at the protest, but all three of his television channels broadcast it live for four hours.

Despite Mr. Yushchenko's apparent new policy restricting reprivatization, he has repeatedly supported a court decision declaring Mr. Pinchuk's acquisition of Nikopol illegitimate.

Mr. Pinchuk, on the other hand, has vowed to continue his appeal because he believes his acquisition of Nikopol was entirely fair.

"That is why we have a decrease in investment and colossal mistrust of businesses in authorities," Mr. Yushchenko told the Rada on September 20. "You are witnessing this. The administration was full of behind-the-scenes maneuvers, slander and groundless, or maybe not, accusations."

Ultimately, Mr. Yushchenko decided it was best that all the parties in the conflict leave office.

"I took this step for the sake of Ukraine, not for the sake of anyone on the government team," Mr. Yushchenko said, referring to accusations that he favored the former National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) Secretary Poroshenko over Ms. Tymoshenko. "Please understand that this was the main element of my motivation."

Although Mr. Poroshenko submitted his resignation on September 8, Washington Times correspondent Natalia Feduschak told the president she saw the former NSDC secretary at the Presidential Secretariat building on September 13.

She said that Secretariat employees told her Mr. Poroshenko's car had been parked at the building almost every day since his September 8 resignation.

In response, Mr. Yushchenko replied that the former secretary was merely picking up documents to finalize his resignation. He did not address her comment that Mr. Poroshenko had been seen at the Secretariat almost daily.

Meanwhile, Procurator General Sviatoslav Piskun announced on September 20 that his office would investigate five criminal cases that involved NSDC officials pressuring court judges in privatization cases.

Mr. Piskun said he found no evidence to pursue criminal charges against Mr. Poroshenko himself and two other individuals accused of corruption by former chief of staff Oleksander Zinchenko: Our Ukraine parliamentary faction leader Mykola Martynenko and former first aide Mr. Tretiakov.

The soap opera involving Mr. Yushchenko and Ms. Tymoshenko grew more dramatic this week, replete with further attacks, attempts at reconciliation and political posturing.

During his September 21 address, Mr. Yushchenko accused Ms. Tymoshenko of trying to sabotage his government accusing her of uniting with the Orange Revolution's enemies.

"I am convinced that a cynical plan of ruining this administration is being carried out in Ukraine," Mr. Yushchenko said. "Moreover, some of those who were on the maidan, as well as those who were opposed to them, are now united in carrying out this plan. A strange alliance. And we are moving towards ruin, my dear friends."

Mr. Yushchenko has accused Ms. Tymoshenko of abusing her post as prime minister to gain personal benefit in her business affairs. Specifically, he has accused her of trying to eliminate $1.5 billion in debt owed to the Ukrainian government by her defunct gas trading company, Unified Energy Systems.

He also has accused her of coercing judges in order to swing ownership of the Nikopol plant to the Dnipropetrovsk-based Pryvat Group, heavily invested in metals, in exchange for ownership in a Ukrainian television network.

On August 20, Pryvat Group partner Ihor Kolomoyskyi declared his intention to buy a 40 percent stake in 1+1, Ukraine's second-highest rated television network.

Ms. Tymoshenko called a press conference on September 21 to announce that she wanted to unite their parties once again and form the new Cabinet.

"I've asked you here to say that I personally, and our entire team, believe that everything that happened surrounding the split of our team with Viktor Yushchenko was a huge mistake," Ms. Tymoshenko said.

In response to Mr. Yushchenko's accusations of trying to eliminate her debts, Ms. Tymoshenko said he is renewing old repressions against her using "ancient, discrediting materials" once employed by Mr. Kuchma.

Mr. Yushchenko invited Ms. Tymoshenko to his meeting with political leaders that night but did not receive her faction's support.

"I'm afraid that this stabilization [proposed by the president] will be so powerful that we will find ourselves on the stable cemetery of democracy if we cover our eyes or squint in a situation when we ought to react to this openly and honestly," Andrii Shkil, a National Deputy of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc, told the Rada before its vote.

Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, September 25, 2005, No. 39, Vol. LXXIII

| Home Page |