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Ukraine's unstable alliances
Contemporary Review, Spring, 2008 by Stefan Simanowitz
'SO they've finished arguing over who will be in the new government', an elderly woman in Kiev told me with a shrug; 'Now the real fighting will begin'. Although the new coalition government looked different from its predecessor, with the telegenic Yulia Tymoshenko at its head, it is the same coalition that spectacularly collapsed after the Orange revolution in 2004 and that was unable to unite following the 2006 parliamentary elections. The 2006 collapse necessitated the prime ministerial reappointment of Viktor Yanukovych whose fraud-tainted election victory had originally sparked the Orange revolution.
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On 30th September 2007, Ukrainians went to the polls for the fifth time in three years in a last-ditch bid to haul the country out of political crisis. The election was called early to end a deadlock that has seen supporters of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych pitted against those of President Viktor Yushchenko. The vote gave the Tymoshenko and Yushchenko blocs a slim majority (with 30.71 per cent and 14.15 per cent respectively) over their rivals, the Party of Regions led by Yanukovych and the Communist Party (with 34.37 per cent and 5.39 per cent respectively). There then followed months of political deadlock and horse-trading. In early December, after tortuous negotiations, President Yushchenko agreed to put forward Tymoshenko as prime minister. However her nomination fell short of endorsement by Ukraine's parliament, the Verkhovna Rada. She was put forward again only to lose out by a single vote. Finally, at the third time of asking and after much public wrangling, Tymoshenko became prime minister with the bare minimum of votes required for confirmation after MPs used an unprecedented roll-call vote to make the decision.
After more than two months in limbo, Ukraine's newly appointed a government looks anything but strong. The coalition is riven by differences of policy and riddled with personal antagonisms and rivalries. A total of 226 seats out of parliament's 450 has made for a fragile working majority. The one-seat majority may be enough to pass uncontentious legislation but it falls a long way short of the two-thirds majority needed to adopt constitutional changes and any hope of a radical reforming agenda will have to be put on hold. This at a time when Ukraine is badly in need of strong decisive leadership.
The muted enthusiasm with which Tymoshenko's appointment has been greeted in Ukraine contrasts starkly with the optimism that was so apparent following the Orange revolution. In the sixteen months following those heady days in 2004, amid rancorous public feuding, the Orange movement tore itself apart. In the four months following the 2006 parliamentary elections it struggled to piece itself together again. It failed then but now the Orange parties had another opportunity to prove that they can work together.
Since becoming independent from the Soviet Union in 1992, Ukraine has been troubled by an absence of constitutional precedent. This has made it hard for all sides to agree on the balance of power between president, parliament, and legislature. This has manifested in the resultant power struggle between Yushchenko and Yanukovych which has dominated recent Ukrainian politics. In April 2007 Mr Yanukovych gained the upper hand after persuading 11 deputies from the pro-presidential Our Ukraine party to join his ruling coalition. This brought him close to the two-thirds majority needed to veto any presidential decree, which would have turned Mr Yushchenko into a lame duck president. Yushchenko responded by dissolving parliament. With Ukraine's constitutional court unable to solve the row, it seemed briefly that the crisis might escalate. In May over three thousand troops led by a commander loyal to Mr Yushchenko and acting in defiance of ministry orders, were reported to be heading to Kiev. Ultimately the crisis was peacefully diffused and both sides agreed to a September pre-term general election. The election result however, and Tymoshenko's appointment seem unlikely to resolve Ukraine's underlying constitutional problems.
Whilst the free and fair conduct of the 2006 and 2007 parliamentary elections may represent an important step forward in Ukraine's democratic development, the results reflect the deep divisions within the country. Yanukovych's pro-Russian Party of Regions won the most votes in the both polls with President Yushchenko's Our Ukraine party pushed into a humiliating third place. Yanukovych's poll results did not signify any increase in his popularity but were rather a reflection of the split between Yushchenko and Tymoshenko. During their nine months in power together, Yushchenko and Tymoshenko had fallen out very publicly amid accusations of corruption. Their feud reached a climax in September 2005 when Yushchenko fired Tymoshenko and she formed her own eponymous opposition party. Yanukovych was able to take advantage of these divisions.
After the 2006 election, a pact on national unity signed by Tymonshenko and her erstwhile Orange revolutionary partner was short-lived. Although Yushchenko agreed to nominate Tymoshenko following the 2007 election, this was an action done of necessity and the bitter divisions that destroyed the coalition before threaten to hamper the efficient running of government. In 2006 and 2007 Yushchenko flirted seriously with the idea of forming a coalition with the Party of Regions. Allying with a former enemy of the Orange Revolution would have been to risk accusations of opportunism or betrayal. Although Yushchenko, might have tried to justify a coalition with the Party of Regions on the grounds of unifying the country, such a coalition was ultimately deemed to be potentially too politically damaging. His credibility as well as his ambition to steer Ukraine towards NATO and EU membership would have been seriously compromised.
