On May 30th, the hammer and sickle symbol of a non-existent state on the Verkhovna Rada building facade gave way to the trident emblem of Ukraine. The decision to remove the Soviet symbols from the VR facade as well as in the debating chamber was made during the first session of the parliamentary majority on January 21. The funds to pay for the new symbols were gathered by the Reforms and Order party, assisted by the Lviv oblast administration. Priests representing Ukraine’s all denominations solemnly blessed the Lviv- made emblem. Parliament has changed its symbols. We only wish the symbols would be followed by other changes.
INCIDENTALLY
Kherson’s oblast governor Oleksandr Verbytsky has issued the other day an order authorizing the oblast authorities to strike off their accounts about 300 run-of-the-mill monuments to the world proletariat leader and his comrades-in-arms, which present no artistic value. This means there will be no more centralized allocation of money for their upkeep and restoration.
Nevertheless, Kherson oblast residents are not going to tear down the monuments themselves. Nor do they intend to change those street nameplates that “immortalize” the events and the names of figures of this controversial epoch. A public-opinion poll conducted by the Kherson newspaper Hryvnia revealed the city dwellers’ complete loyalty to the communist past. Kherson residents raised no essential objections to continue to reside on streets named after Lenin, Illich, Krupskaya, Dmitry Ulianov or the October Revolution, and to stroll across the Lenin and Leninist Komsomol parks. The people are aware that street renaming accompanied by no real changes will only make a new hole in the city’s already meager budget.
As for the monuments to “flamboyant revolutionaries,” any “sympathetic” citizen can now keep them up should he or she choose to allocate from his own pocket the money needed for their maintenance.
