The MPs opened the fall session on September 6 to the sound of protesters chanting slogans and miners banging their helmets on the pavement. Tanned and rested MPs listened dutifully to solemn speeches delivered by the president and the speaker of the Rada and then took to work.
After as always passionate speech of the president, all MPs, including those of the opposition, got their say. Notorious Yurii Boiko delivered a few messages from the rostrum detailing his opposition to the course of the nation and left the debate chamber in the company of Vadym Novynsky. Looking at that pair, other MPs were just outraged to see Boiko still sitting in the Rada instead of occupying his well-deserved bunk in jail. Sporting an unplaited braid, Yulia Tymoshenko delivered more of similar angry rhetoric. Meanwhile, Serhii Liovochkin went as far as to say that “Ukraine has gone back to the era of the Inquisition.” The burned-out server room of Inter TV channel gave some credence to such statements in this case.
The presidential speech was preceded by that of Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada Andrii Parubii who made a ritual mention of the need to combat corruption which he believes will help fill the public coffers, and condemned infamous Judge Mykola Chaus. However, Parubii failed to recall where and why the judge, who famously stored dollars in glass jars in his kitchen garden, fled. They say he was already in Crimea when the Rada was voting to grant consent to his detention and arrest. The government was just as “quick to act” on quite a few previous occasions as well. Take, for example, the story of Serhii Kliuiev who was declared a wanted person after he bid farewell to the law-enforcement operatives at the airport.
So, what were the president’s key messages?
Firstly: “Ideas of getting peace in exchange for land are delusions. This approach will bring us neither peace nor land, but only shame and ever-smoldering conflict.”
Secondly: “My chief objective was, is, and will be fighting for the restoration of territorial integrity of Ukraine within our 1991 borders.”
Thirdly: “Putin’s statement that the Crimean issue is closed is just so much of delirious ravings. Although it was closed in 1954 and then in 1991, when it was determined that Crimea was, is and will be Ukrainian!”
The president’s annual address to the Verkhovna Rada “On Internal and External Situation of Ukraine in 2016” can be accessed in full at president.gov.ua/en/news/ shorichne-poslannya-prezidenta- do-verhovnoyi-radi-pro-vnutri-38077.
However, neither the president nor his supporting services have commented on the statements made, for instance, by Nursultan Nazarbayev, who said a month ago that Petro Poroshenko was ready to make concessions on the issue of the occupied territories, but “his parliament was hindering his efforts for some reason.” Moreover, even the presidential statements reaffirming the “strategic course towards NATO” look dubious, because we know that Ukraine has not had an official representative at the alliance’s headquarters for a long time. It was expected that the appointment would take place during the NATO summit in Warsaw in July this year, but these expectations came to naught. What prevents the president from confirming the “strategic course” with specific actions and appointments? Can it be that this course is not really that “strategic”?
BY-ELECTIONS OF JULY 2016 BROUGHT NEW LEGISLATORS TO THE PARLIAMENT. ONE OF THEM IS IRYNA KONSTANKEVYCH OF THE UKROP PARTY, WHO HAS STRONG STARTING POSITIONS (SHE CAME FROM THE EDUCATION SYSTEM) AND GOOD PROSPECTS / Photo by Ruslan KANIUKA, The Day
In fact, these parallel realities of our domestic and foreign policy hint at legitimate questions, including those regarding discrepancies between leaders’ speeches and their actions. The public is actually experiencing dissonance brought about by this discrepancy, which only reinforces negative attitudes which are clearly exploited by pro-Russian forces. And we should call a spade a spade here, because those who call themselves the “party of peace” have, in fact, brought war to our land. But amid utter impoverishment of the masses and war fatigue, these same forces continue to feed dangerous sentiments. Banging of miners’ helmets is in this case not only an echo of a possible rebellion, but primarily an echo of some politicians’ regular appearances on partially burned-out TV channels.
“OUR STRATEGIC FLAW IS THE POVERTY OF THE UKRAINIAN PEOPLE”
Vitalii KURYLO, MP, Fatherland faction:
“In politics, we always have to do with declarations and deeds. One must understand this nuance. I speak now as a resident of Luhansk region, and maintain that much has been done over those two years. The first point is our defense capability that has grown out of all comparison with what it was before. This is a fact. In 23 years, the army was just destroyed. Now we have a real army. Moreover, it is an army that is really fighting, and thus has practical experience gained in the toughest conditions of the ‘hybrid warfare.’ Russia’s actions, oddly enough, have forced the world to pay attention to Ukraine. However, the issue of the masses’ standard of living has not been resolved. The poverty of the people is our strategic flaw, a major vulnerability. Also, there is a danger of the parliament passing the laws on the so-called ‘special’ or any other status for the occupied territories. Here, the MPs have to show their patriotism. Destabilizing processes in the Donbas and Crimea had to be suppressed immediately, just as they started. Now we have a problem which is very difficult to cope with, and I understand the complexity of the challenges facing the president.”
“WE ARE SEEING WEIRD DOCUMENTS ON DE-OCCUPATION BEING BORN”
Serhii KUNITSYN, MP, Petro Poroshenko Bloc, head of the Ukrainian Association of the Afghan War Veterans:
“I am not satisfied with the Ukrainian government’s approach to the occupied territories of the Donbas and Crimea. Let me offer you an example. Last week, the Cabinet of Ministers was issuing the program of de-occupation of the Donbas and Crimea. I asked government leaders: ‘Why I, prime minister of Crimea, had not been invited to the discussion of this program? Why neither Mustafa Dzhemilev nor Refat Chubarov were invited? Thus, we are seeing weird documents on de-occupation being born, composed by people who have no links to the occupied lands and who do not know all the local nuances and problems. As for some kind of parallel diplomacy, I believe that for the sake of liberating our territories, the president may conduct dialog even with the Devil himself.”
“AS LONG AS THE OLIGARCHY EXISTS IN UKRAINE, WE WILL ALWAYS HAVE CLANS TRYING TO MAKE THE PRESIDENT DEPEND ON THEM”
Serhii VYSOTSKY, MP, People’s Front faction:
“Some people fail to grasp that the state is a large ship, which is very difficult to turn. It is not only domestic politicians who take their clues from presidential statements. His messages are important for the West as well, since the latter needs to understand what course our country is going. Our direction is a right one. However, it is unclear how long we will be going down this path. Objectively, we cannot cover this distance in a year. We need at least 20 years to do it. It is the consequences of the lack of political responsibility displayed in 23 pre-war years.
“Poroshenko is by nature an authoritarian person, no question about it. But his real powers depend on the voters’ support. One should recognize that the voters gave a lot of support to the PPB in the latest legislative election. Of course, as long as the oligarchy exists in Ukraine, we will always have clans trying to make the president depend on them. It is an objective reality. The nation has to live with it. That is why the first thing that the public needs to do is to overcome the domination of oligarchic clans. This is our task, the MPs’ task as well. If this is not done, the radical changes in the country just will not happen. The development of a middle class is a precondition for it. Only it will be able to out-compete and undermine the oligarchy’s basis.”
“PRESIDENTIAL SPEECHWRITER OLEH MEDVEDIEV DESERVES HIGHEST PRAISE”
Ihor MOSIICHUK, MP, Oleh Liashko’s Radical Party:
“Absolutely, there is a dissonance between the president’s statements and his real moves. Presidential speechwriter Oleh Medvediev deserves highest praise. The speech was brilliantly written. He even quoted the OUN members’ works on a few occasions. But the truth of the matter is that under the present government, the people will have to keep hoping against hope.”
“MPS SHOULD BLOCK CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS ON THE SO-CALLED ‘SPECIAL STATUS’”
Oksana SYROID, First Deputy Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada:
“The first thing on the parliament’s agenda should be the 2017 budget. Secondly, we have to block constitutional amendments on the so-called ‘special status’ and elections in the occupied territories. These are the two main points that should be made in the parliament. I would like to pay special attention to the issue of what we should do to prevent any attempts at bulldozing any such amendments to the Constitution through the Rada. After all, this pressure will continue for years. Concerning the president’s policy in this regard, I must say that the problem of the Minsk format is that it is not public. Hence we have stories of parallel diplomacy spreading. I think that negotiations within the political and economic subgroups should be made public.”
