Our Ukraine Convention: The Hard Choices

By Oksana Bashuk Hepburn

The recent Our Ukraine Bloc Convention offered President Yushchenko the opportunity to seize the moment and bring Ukraine back to the course it set during and the days following the Orange Revolution.  He must decline to run again as a presidential candidate, which is key to ensuring a united support for the other potential Orange contender, Yulia Tymoshenko.  To split the Orange vote and prevent it once again from holding power in Ukraine, as Machiavellian as it might seem, may be the real reason for Mr. Yushchenko’s renewed interest in the Presidency and the accompanying endorsement by the Party of Regions.

The Prime Minister’s Party of Regions is paying attention to Mr. Yushchenko’s decision like a good watch-dog of Russia’s interests it is alleged to be. Therefore, recent support for Mr. Yushchenko’s next bid for the Presidency by Party of Regions spokesman Taras Chornovil must be viewed with alarm.

It is not as if the President has done well in Office.  Supposedly pro-West, Mr. Yushchenko has alienated many who staged a revolution to elect him.  He failed to hold his Orange government and emasculated his own Our Ukraine Party.  His Unity document, the quid pro quo for calling Prime Minister Victor Yanukovych to power, is all but ignored.  During his watch, Russia grabbed the control of Ukraine’s energy sector.  Ukraine’s greatest asset, its grain, rotted in terminals while many went hungry in unheated homes. In response, his popularity rating and international opinion are low.

 Is Mr. Yushchenko attempting a miraculous rescue by lately endorsing the rapprochement between Yulia Tymoshenko’s BYuT and Our Ukraine? There is a more sinister play here. Mr. Yanukovych and his handlers are aiming to play the Yushchenko card against Ms. Tymoshenko once again.  Many believe that the President cut a deal to keep her out of power in the past.  If so, he’s been keeping his promise.  He dismissed her twice as the Prime Minister. He denied the Orange forces their right to govern after the last parliamentary election in order to keep her out again.

Since the betrayal of the Orange Revolution and the post-March elections shenanigans, Ms. Tymoshenko has not cowered and rallies as the standard bearer for Ukraine’s pro-West democrats as their opposition leader in Parliament.  She fights Mr. Yanukovych’s pro-Russia stance for Ukraine’s control of the energy issue. There is a 98% approval for the cancellation of parliamentarians’ immunity, and calls for the separation of politics and business. She completed a successful visit to Washington aiming to convince the powerful friend not to lose sight of the seriousness of Ukraine’s fight for democracy.

There is no question the pro-Russia forces have no interest in seeing the resurrection of strong Orange forces in Ukraine with Ms. Tymoshenko as President. The Party of Regions handlers know that a unified Orange surge would give the country clear choices between pro-West and pro-Russia options; between democratization and a reversal; greater national independence or greater Russian supremacy over Ukraine. The Regions’ strategy is to have Mr. Yushchenko run on behalf of the Orange forces against Ms. Tymoshenko and split the pro-West vote in favour of a third presidential candidate from the Party of Regions, Mr. Yanukovych, perhaps? 

A recent presidential election poll reported by UNIAN, Ukraine’s press service, supports this.  If all three ran for office now, Mr. Yanukovych would obtain about 26% of the vote, Ms. Tymoshenko about 16% and the President only about 11%.  Thinking Ukrainians know these ratings - nearly 50% declined to state their preference for any of the three candidates - and may be waiting for a clearer choice.

The clear choice must emerge from the Convention. The outcome must be for Our Ukraine delegates to decide, alone, what they want Mr. Yushchenko to do. Given the Machiavellian machinations and political scenario of ‘divide and conquer’ that is unfolding in Ukraine, the magnitude of the delegates’ decision rivals that of the Orange Revolution. 

For Mr. Yushchenko, the Convention could be his moment of redemption, his chance to leave a noble legacy of a man who was poisoned for leading a freedom charge, won but was duped by enemy forces, only to come back to set Ukraine on a path to greater prosperity for all. The honourable step to take is not to be a candidate in the next presidential elections. Failure to do so plays the trap laid for him and drag down any chances for victory for the pro-West Orange forces. 

If he is a man of the Orange Revolution, Mr. Yushchenko will strengthen the union among the Orange forces by choosing to leave politics at the end of his term in Office.  If he is a Russian-pawn in the hands of the Party of Regions, he will declare his candidacy for the next presidential elections.  Equally bad, he may equivocate, postpone his decision and play for time as he has done with disastrous consequences to the Orange coalition in the past. The purpose of the Convention is for delegates to hold the voting power to accept or reject him as their leader, presidential candidate or both.

The prestige of the Presidency, their party, and an Orange victory are more important than one failed man, manipulated by the enemy. Can the delegates’ failure to prevent Mr. Yushchenko from either running or stalling be perceived as the enemy manipulating them as well?

 Oksana Bashuk Hepburn is the President of U*CAN, a consulting company specializing in Ukraine since 1991.  She is a frequent commentator on Ukraine’s political scene.