“WE SHOULD INVITE YOUNG PEOPLE TO DIALOGUE”
Iryna BEKESHKINA, director, Ilko Kucheriv Democratic Initiative Foundation:
“The National Roundtable was a very good idea. It is high time our moral luminaries said their word to society. Indeed, roundtable participants came up with a lot of good ideas and interesting proposals. To what extent these will be put into practice depends on each of us. Another question is whether we will maintain close ties and how often we will be meeting to discuss pressing problems. What we are going to do next is so far unclear to me.
“I believe that, before we gather, as planned, in the autumn, we should form theme groups that will draw up suggestions and ideas and only then we can begin to make joint announcements. I am convinced we should invite youth to dialogue. I know some very well-educated young people who head non-governmental organizations and have their own vision of this country’s development. But I saw only one young person – Viktoria Siumar – among the eight roundtable participants.
“We must not be naive and think that the grassroots will immediately understand and follow intellectuals. No one is following even politicians today. It is difficult to imagine that an ‘alpha intellectual’ like this will come some day and say how one should live and everybody will at once run after him or her. The point is that people who really care about normal development of this country and who have an impact on public awareness, such as journalists, academics, and influential politicians, can and must understand the principal message of this movement. I think, incidentally, that this movement should make itself known from time to time by commenting, among other things, on the statements and actions of present-day politicians and on the upcoming election campaign.
“Not to forget the conclusions of every previous meeting, the theme groups should apparently consist of the sections in which we have already worked. These sections may be headed by theme leaders who will supervise the work of all the participants. Naturally, meetings should be concrete and subject-oriented even in the format of a roundtable. They should not necessarily draw so many participants and broach so many broad-based themes as the first National Roundtable did. Our section seems to have identified an informal leader, Ihor Koliushko. I would not mind him continuing to do this work. But, let me say it again, I cannot see so far the general picture of our joint work in the future. Unfortunately, the National Roundtable failed to work out any concrete mechanisms.”
“THE SITUATION MUST BE CHANGED ‘from below’ by way of the self-organization of people
Yevhen HOLOVAKHA, Doctor of Science (Philosophy); deputy director, Institute of Sociology, National Academy of Science, Ukraine:
“As a member of the National Roundtable organizing committee, I also bear responsibility for the level of this event. If it went off badly, I am also to blame for this. I have a generally good opinion of this Ukrainian Home forum as the first step towards rallying all the people who are aware of our society being in a moral and political crisis. This was not done in vain. However, if this roundtable debate remains the first and last step, it will be of little use, of course.
“As for the future of this initiative, one should devise a concrete mechanism of work. The participants have their own viewpoints on the forms of this work. In my opinion, the National Roundtable should be sort of an integrative force of Ukraine’s civil society, for, as we could see, it comprises some quite well-known people who have a certain impact on the situation and cherish enduring spiritual and moral values. It is these people who must play the role of an integrative force. In my view, the roundtable should be held systematically and rally more and more people around the idea of positive social changes on the basis of new values. This initiative will only have a future if it manages to further ramify its infrastructure. I personally suggest the National Roundtable be not just an abstraction, but a real organization with a large number of conscientious members. It is only in this way that all those who join civic organizations in Ukraine can draw moral and, if necessary, legal support from the National Roundtable’s central body. Accordingly, this will need the formation of organizational and juridical substructures. In other words, one should broadly develop and spread the idea of a societal dialogue that was endorsed on April 5. The roundtable’s representatives should work in every region. It is no secret that people who live in the regions are more unprotected. They must feel our support.
“The National Roundtable is absolutely independent of the authorities. The ‘lower’ the level of the organized cells is, the stronger the resistance to the government will be.
“Looking back on the first meeting’s format, I must say there should be exclusively meetings of specialist task forces rather than ceremonial assemblies in the future. And we must speak not just about general things and a grand strategy, but about concrete steps and actions for Ukraine to get out of dire straits. The more I recall the first roundtable, the more I am convinced that it was a purely ceremonial and, to some extent, symbolic event. A number of conscientious people got together and said out loud: we are worried over the future of Ukraine, we should not throw this country at the mercies of the powers that be, the situation must be changed not only ‘from above,’ but also ‘from below’ by way of the self-organization of people who are really striving for positive changes.
“Now that the first National Roundtable has been held, we must not sit down and wait for the next session in the fall. We must actively work right bow on outlining the general strategy of our work.
“Regrettably, our central TV channels ignored the National Roundtable because they are just not very much interested in the development of a civil society. The reason is very simple: TV channels now belong to Ukraine’s richest people. And the richest people, naturally, cooperate with the government only. The government in turn does not need civil society at all.
“I will say frankly: I believe the National Roundtable will produce practical results. If I had thought it was a noble, necessary, but hopeless, thing, I wouldn’t have just taken part in it.”
Signals that are important for society and the government should be sent right now
The National Roundtable created missed impressions. It is gratifying, of course, to see in one hall so many intelligent and authoritative people who have gathered to discuss the situation in the country. There were speeches that made “diagnoses” and offered remedies to “cure” our old and current ailments. One could feel an aspiration to offer society a topical “agenda.” There was quite a clear message about the acute necessity of a dialogue between the authorities and the public.
But still…
What result was the roundtable supposed to produce? In my view, it was to work out at least two documents simultaneously addressed to society and the authorities. One is short and the other is long. The short one was to have harshly criticized the government’s actions that have thrown us far away from Europe. This document would have shown society a clear-cut description of the most burning problems, such as social inequality and, above all, a cavalier attitude of the state to human rights.
The long document was to have offered a comprehensive proposal of intellectuals about an “agenda” for Ukraine.
But, for some reason, everything ended up in… a pause. In other words, section chiefs reported at the final session on the projects drawn up at local meetings, and then the “headquarters” should sum up all the proposals and make some of them public. When? It is not quite clear. And the pause is unlikely to be of benefit for the cause. The moment, when interest in the “December 1” pressure group could be aroused, has been lost.
Too bad indeed… Tellingly, a few days before the roundtable debate, the authorities were clearly excited, not knowing what to expect from the initiative of moral luminaries. It turned out that the President Viktor Yanukovych of Ukraine and Vice-Premier Raisa Bohatyriova had received the organizers in an attempt to sound out the situation. On the same day, April 5, the President’s Humanitarian Council announced quite a few initiatives about celebrating the 200th birth anniversary of Taras Shevchenko – Bankova St. was seeking some positive alternatives to what was to occur at Ukrainian Home.
Now Bankova St. can breathe a sigh of relief: there was no “explosion,” maybe, because too many participants were in a too academic and preaching mood, preferring general words to concrete proposals. Sad as it is to recall it, but this may resemble the story of the Ukrainian Intelligentsia Congress, when an originally good idea found no proper application. Does it really matter that the roundtable may be also held in the fall? The signals that are important for society and the authorities should be sent right now.
I took part in drawing up proposals from the humanitarian section, and I do not think, in spite of everything, that this work was done in vain: in each case, one must address the final document to those whom it may concern and think hard about further actions.
I would like to remind The Day readers of an idea proposed to the roundtable: I mean the project “Address to the Political Parties that Will Participate in the Ukrainian Parliamentary Elections in October 2012.” Here is its text:
“For years on end, millions of Ukrainian citizens have seen an unfair political practice to which members of this country’s legislative body often resort. The MPs, who are supposed to show respect for the Constitution, the laws, and elementary moral standards, are in fact discrediting the law and morality by their actions. Voting with somebody else’s cards, defecting from faction to faction, putting private interests above the national ones, and failing to fulfill the duties of an MP – all this cannot but demoralize society and compromise the very institution of parliamentarianism in Ukraine.
“The stunning legal and moral nihilism in the Verkhovna Rada calls into question the legitimacy of the passed laws and takes Ukraine away from European standards.
“With this in view, we demand that leaders of the political parties that will take part in the parliamentary elections make a firm public commitment:
1) to publicize exhaustive information on each of the candidates on the election list (education, place of employment, declaration of incomes and expenditures, etc.);
2) to strictly fulfill the requirement of the Constitution of Ukraine that members of parliament vote in person;
3) to be only part of the political force on behalf of which the MP was elected to the Verkhovna Rada;
4) not to absent themselves from sessions of the Verkhovna Rada, standing committees, etc.
“We reserve the right to call upon voters not to vote for the parties that will evade meeting their public commitments to fulfill the aforesaid requirements.”
I am aware that politicians can be insincere, but nobody can preclude us from viewing their insincerity in the proper perspective.
