The decision of Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko to appoint Mikheil Saakashvili, the former president of Georgia, as chairman of the Odesa Oblast State Administration has caused a big stir among the general public and politicians. The Internet is rife with both “+” and “–”comments.
There can be different attitudes to the ex-president of Georgia as well as to the whole “foreign mission” in Ukraine. But this whole story about the appointment of foreigners, including Saakashvili, against whom criminal proceedings have been initiated in Georgia, raises a lot of questions. Naturally, this step cannot be regarded outside the Poroshenko-Kolomoisky confrontation line. But the point is not only in this. There are a lot of factors that show the importance of form and content. Experience proves that nighttime granting of citizenship and appointments do not produce a good result. This high-profile topic needs to be further discussed.
“FOR NOW, SAAKASHVILI’S APPOINTMENT IS ONLY A SHELL WHICH STILL HAS TO BE FILLED WITH REAL ACTIONS”
By Valentyn TORBA, The Day
President Petro Poroshenko, leaving aside the sale of his Lipetsk factory in Russia, declared war on oligarchs. This war he is really waging. Truth be said, until now he has focused only on one opponent, the well-known oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky. Recently the President pulled out another brick from the foundation on which Kolomoisky’s clout in Ukraine (or more precisely, in Odesa oblast) rests, by dismissing the head of the Odesa Oblast State Administration Ihor Palytsia. Clearly, such a step could have only damaged the president’s image, if not in Odesa, then in other regions: everyone remembers that it is thanks to Palytsia (or rather to Kolomoisky) that Odesa could be held stable during the pro-Russian forces’ active attempts to shatter the region. And it was held thanks to decisive, even daring steps, on the one hand, and to balancing, on the other. It is rumored in Odesa that Palytsia (i.e. Kolomoisky) paid from his own pocket to settle complicated, controversial issues. This fact does not seem surprising at all: from my experience in Luhansk I know how certain people in contingency would loosen their own purse strings to buy flashbangs and ground pepper to fill them with, as well as other, more serious stuff. That was the only way to act under the circumstances. In one way or another, but at a critical moment past year the situation in Odesa (and in Ukraine in general) was not allowed to go out of hand. Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhia (which was within the range of Kolomoisky’s personal clout), Odesa and Kharkiv (everyone remembers tough phone talks between Kolomoisky and the Regionnaires in top Kharkiv administration). These cities became the backbone, which Putin failed to break. And this was exactly what the aggressor looked up to, having annexed Crimea without too much trouble. Ukraine was to have caved in under Molotov cocktails, oligarch feuds, and new fault lines in society.
But it never happened. Only Donbas broke, the region dominated by the myrmidon of Kuchma and communists. By the way, no one other than Rinat Akhmetov got an offer to lead Donetsk oblast, which he declined, giving way to less wealthy and more pliable Serhii Taruta. It is worth while looking into why he did so.
Thus, removing Palytsia on any pretext, including the anti-corruption campaign, would have earned Poroshenko nothing but denunciation. However, over the past year we have got used to see the president turn a problem into a show with distraction effects. Whenever he accounted for his work, or during retreating from the Donetsk Airport, Debaltseve, and other situations which were fraught with blame and problems for the president, there were show arrests of officials right in the middle of cabinet meetings, as well as sensational exposures of petty violations, or incidents with certain government ministers. And all this to serve as a red herring to distract attention from the state’s apparent faults. So, it somehow obliterated the fact that no one other but an oligarch-president declares war on oligarchy. As if the president had factored himself out.
So this time around Poroshenko made a conspicuous step by appointing another president in lieu of Palytsia. Namely, Georgia’s ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili. The right-wings’ denouncement of Poroshenko for manning his team with foreigners were drowned in an avalanche of joy emanated by other right-wings, who believe that the Ukrainian managerial bench is too short and is already exhausted. In some ways, this situation brings to memory a last year’s election motto in the so-called LNR: “Come join us, there will be all our people.” And suddenly even to criticize such an appointment, against the backdrop of Russian media’s hysteria, begins to look like working for Russia. Criticism would mean joining the army of Putin’s trolls. It does not matter that one of the first enthusiastic supporters of Saakashvili’s appointment was no one other than Serhii Kivalov, whose deputy, a priest from the Moscow Patriarchate, recently celebrated his birthday with a cake sporting “DNR” written in cream.
One cannot but acknowledge Saakashvili’s merits in reforming his native Georgia, albeit the study of their results will certainly require our close attention, without unnecessary idealization. It is one thing when our officials are confronted with examples of other countries’ expertise, and quite another when authors of those examples are invited to Ukraine. Of course, the newly appointed governor needs some time, so we could appreciate to what extent he will be able to adapt to the specific Ukrainian conditions. For he will face ultra complex challenges, from fighting corruption to cardinal staff policy in a very specific city, the “gem on the sea shore,” the home of notorious criminals perpetuated by Babel in his works, age-old traditions of contraband, corruption, and a complex tangle of ethnic and cultural strata. In a system of total corruption, abuse of power, cronyism, and absolute reluctance to see own shortcomings, Saakashvili risks not only failing the region, but also losing his own face after reinforcing the Ukrainian president’s popularity rating.
For now, Saakashvili’s appointment is only a shell which still has to be filled with real actions, or with unreal populism. Time will show. Let us not forget that Odesa is one of the targets for Putin who, most likely, is planning a blow in accordance with his KGB habits, by sabotaging the rears first, and then marching his troops in. Not far from Odesa, surrounded in the so-called TMR [Transnistrian Moldovan Republic. – Ed.], Russian troops are deployed like a dagger in our flank. Just as in the south, in Crimea. So, here the important factor is the ability to combine decisiveness and self-control. The hot temper, which Saakashvili displayed in Tskhinvali when he gave in to the Russian provocation, can prove disastrous.
There is an opinion in Odesa that, despite all of his charisma, Saakashvili will be a temporary phenomenon in Odesa. The president’s main goal is to let his former colleague gain administrative experience under Ukrainian conditions and eventually prepare Saakashvili to become candidate for prime minister. At the moment, except for Speaker Volodymyr Hroisman, who holds the fort at the Verkhovna Rada for the president, Poroshenko has no serious candidate to replace Yatseniuk.
At the moment, many patriots revel in sweet dreams: now we are going to show Russia and the insurgent Donbas what it means to fight corruption and build a progressive country in a separate oblast (why not in the scale of entire state?). We need optimism, indeed. But such optimism must not become a shallow psychotherapy.
