This is an act of protest against the decision of the Kyiv City Council to evict the Ukrainian Encyclopedia Publishing House from its premises. Near the five-storied building in downtown Kyiv on 51a Khmelnytsky Str., representatives of Ukrainian intelligentsia — poet Ivan Drach, writer Vasyl Folvarochny, conductor Ivan Hamkalo, academician Rostyslan Pylypchyk, publishers, and editors — joined hands to create a human chain.
“The October 29 session of the Kyiv City Council adopted a decision to take away our right to rent the premises we have occupied since 1958,” said Mykhailo Ziabliuk, head of the Ukrainian Encyclopedia Publishing House, in an interview given to The Day. “Apart from us, the building is also home to the Knyha Pamiati Ukrainy Agency and the editorial office of the children’s magazine Soniashnyk. They will also find themselves on the street. Eviction means destruction. How can we find a new facility for our huge library and archive, which were created by multiple generations of Ukrainian scholars and editors?”
Our readers will remember that a number of publishing houses — Ukraina, Zdorovia, Mystetstvo, Tekhnika, Muzychna Ukraina, and Lybid — fell victims to this kind of arbitrary rule by the Kyiv city authorities and were forced to move from their downtown premises to unsuitable facilities in the suburbs. In a similar way, Kyiv’s specialized bookstores were annihilated, such as Poezia, Mystetstvo, Peredplatni vydannia, Propahandyst, Svitohliad, Sportyvna knyha, Zmina, Noty, Knyha-poshtoiu, Tekhnichna knyha, Knyzhkovyi svit, Medychna knyha, Planeta, and others.
To put an end to this situation, the Verkhovna Rada passed the Regulation “On Imposing a Moratorium on Evictions of Editorial Offices of the Printed Mass Media and Cultural Institutions, Including Libraries, Publishing Houses, Bookstores, and Book Distribution Companies” in January 2009. The State Committee for Television and Radio Broadcasting (Derzhkomteleradio), which manages state publishing houses, urgently prepared and submitted to the Cabinet of Ministers a draft law. Its title expands on the one mentioned above with the following addition: “from State- and Community-Owned Premises they Are Lawfully Occupying and on Demolition of the Existing Press Kiosks.”
However, even valid legislation cannot stop Kyiv’s municipal authorities. They are now targeting Ukrainska Entsyklopedia, Ukraine’s only research institution producing encyclopedic editions. Since its foundation in 1927, it has published over 200 universal and specialized encyclopedias, encyclopedic reference books, and dictionaries. Owing to its efforts, Ukraine is now among the 25 countries that have their own universal encyclopedias.
“We have received an official reply from the Kyiv City State Administration signed by Irena Kilchytska, which explains that the actions of the Kyiv City Council to strip Ukrainska Entsyklopedia of the right to occupy its premises are dictated by ‘the interests of the community’,” said Oleh Nalyvaiko, acting head of Derzhkomteleradio.
The formal pretext for this move is arrears in rent, which, in its turn, is caused by the fact that Ukrainska Entsyklopedia relies on government contracts. This year it is supposed to publish four books financed under the budget program “Ukrainian book,” but the first money transfer was made as late as November. Today the publishing house has over 500,000 hryvnias on its account and can pay the rent and the heating bill. However, this is not the decisive factor. The main thing is to take away the premises, which are a dainty morsel for some people.
Little is known about precisely who these people are. The site of the Ministry of Justice says that it is the Zdorovia maibutnioho (Health of the Future) charity foundation, registered in March 18, 2005. Interestingly, its office is now located on 3 Dovzhenka Str., in the building occupied by state-owned Ukrvydavpolihrafiia. Even more remarkably, the foundation loves children and books — it co-organizes the campaign “With books to children.” Meanwhile, its president, Hanna Platok, is unable to explain what it plans to fill the four stories of the disputed building with.
The protesting intellectuals have signed an appeal to the country’s leadership, demanding an end to hostile takeovers of publishing houses. The first petitioners on the list are Dmytro Pavlychko, Petro Tronko, Yurii Shemshuchenko, Mykhailo Sikorsky, Borys Oliinyk, Ivan Dziuba, Ihor Yukhnovsky, Kostiantyn Sytnyk, and others. The petition can be signed by anyone who wants to protect Ukrainska Entsyklopedia.
