Vujko Ilko: A country is not run by questions.

By Oksana Bashuk Hepburn

Snail-mail brings a letter from Uncle Ilko.  His distinctive scrawl devotes several pages to mental callisthenics, his designation for matters dealing with Ukrainian issues.  It’s all here in point form:

In Ukraine:

• Don’t give up on Ukraine.  President Viktor Yanukovych doesn’t have much wiggle room.  The Ruski press him on all sides to join the Customs Union.  So far, he’s “studying” it like any smart politician should

The phone rings. 

“Ah Vujku, just got your letter. What do you mean it’s dated?  Aha, yes, I see.  Yanukovych sold out to Russia by selling off the strategic enterprises for less expensive energy?  You’re not the only one.  Many were hoping he would withstand Russia’s pressure.  Vujku, let me read the whole letter and call you back.

I return to Uncle’s points:

• Jakyj didko, what pressure, forced him to sign the decree allowing the Soviet [Red Army] Flag above the Blue and Yellow? And why after the May Day celebration passed?  Was he stalling in the hope the moment might pass or to delay further street confrontation?  The boy is thinking.  So are the Russians.

• By stopping his hunger strike, Yurij Lutsenko, Leader of the Self Defence Party, saved the government from a huge mess, yet sent the message that his illegal arrest was intolerable; a point for the good guys.

• Don’t feel good about Ukraine’s protests not having a clear leader.  What can they do without one should they get what they want?  They must use what they have already fought hard for and won; a democratic process - elections, parliament - to change governments. Ukraine’s democracy is further along than the Arab Spring.  Ukraine’s problem is the weakened opposition.  Ukrainians need to strengthen it if they mean to win parliamentary elections only months away.  If people rally behind the opposition, they have a political alternative, otherwise, who gets their vote?  Vote “For No One” was President Yushchenko’s final blow to Yulia Tymoshenko’s 5% loss; one for the bad guys.

• Bravo to the newly-elected Head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.  It’s vibrant, forward-looking image keeps getting stronger.   

In Canada:

• Very sorry to hear about the election loss of Liberal MP Borys Wrzesnewskyj by a mere 26 votes! Divide and conquer works.  The Conservatives do it as well as anyone.  But our community does not need to eat its young in order to get concessions from them.  We should find ways to have our cake and eat it too. Mr. Wrzesnewskyj, what say you to running as the Liberal leader?

• What’s going on in Saskatchewan?  The Metropolitan Sheptytsky Institute Board has resigned.  How much control should a bishop exact over the lay organizations and operations?  As if this were not enough, Muse Ukraine Museum - started by the Eparchy’s Ukrainian Catholic Women’s League - is being denied Eparchy support.  This is not healthy and must be resolved.

• Why did Alexandra Chyczij, VP heading the human rights and development committees resign from the Ukrainian Canadian Congress? Disagreement over UCC policy?  Leadership styles?  It would be good for the public to know otherwise, little organizational learning takes place.

• The Shevchenko Monument is going up in Ottawa on the Catholic Shrine site.  The Monument to the Victims of Communist Totalitarianism’s site is in the Garden of the Provinces near Parliament Hill.  If location is everything, Shevchenko has lost out.  For the future 125^th anniversary celebrating Ukrainian settlement in Canada, we should resist brick and mortar, and focus on establishing an ongoing policy centre or think tank.  Ideas win!  And this is how to do it.

• Annual reports show that some of our organizations are wealthy.  So why are these funds sitting in banks rather than supporting the organizations’ missions and meeting community needs?  Establishing a think tank is key, as is organizational development - two critical aspects to make organizational life flourish.

• Here’s a big one: refocus mission statements of organizations from “preserving” to ‘developing” as the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms allows us to do.  What a great turn-around after 120 years of “preserving” in Canada.  For the next 120 years, let’s advance!

Elsewhere:

• A Wiesenthal Center’s historian is not happy with Timothy Snyder’s Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin.  It undermines, Efrim Zuroff claims, Holocaust’s exclusivity.  What an unworthy  position for an institution dedicated to “never again”.  Or does “never again” apply exclusively to one people? The exposure, finally, of Holodomor and other atrocities on the blood-soaked lands of Poland, Ukrajina and Belarus, is long overdue.  It would be better regarded if Jews like Dr. Zuroff condemned the perpetrators or the crime rather than those who expose it.

The phone again.  It was Vujko.  Dr. Ihor Ostash, Ukraine’s Ambassador to Canada is being recalled.  He will take part in the Pioneer Train and the Shevchenko unveiling.  His replacement has not been named.

I’m dashing off to Uncle Ilko’s immediately.  Won’t you join me?