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Orange Revolution loser rebounds PDF Print E-mail
Monday, 16 January 2006

KIEV. A campaign ad broadcast repeatedly on television here shows a man basking in the adulation of flag-waving crowds reminiscent of the protests that overturned the fraudulent presidential election of 2004.

But this is not Viktor Yushchenko, who rode those protests to the presidency, vowing to turn Ukraine into a free and prosperous democracy.

He is the man Yushchenko defeated, Viktor Yanukovich, the chosen heir of a discredited and unpopular government who would have been president but for those huge street demonstrations and international diplomatic pressure.

A year ago, Yanukovich appeared disgraced, abandoned even by his own supporters. Now he leads a party predicted to win the most seats in the parliamentary elections only a little more than two months away. Yushchenko, on the other hand, has been discredited by scandals, a worsening economy and internal disputes over policy that led him to fire a popular prime minister.

At a minimum Yanukovich could have a decisive role in choosing the country's new - and newly empowered - prime minister. He could even become prime minister himself, sharing power with his bitter rival.

"We have set this goal: to win the election," Yanukovich said in an interview at his party headquarters in a renovated 19th-century mansion here.

The March 26 election, in which thousands of candidates from 45 parties are competing for 450 parliamentary seats, will be the first electoral test of the political changes that Yushchenko promised during what became known as the Orange Revolution.

But after a year of turmoil that culminated in popular anger over his handling of a dispute with Russia over natural gas, the prospects for Yushchenko's coalition are not promising. In a poll released Friday by the Democratic Initiative Fund, Yanukovich's Party of Regions was selected by 31 percent of those who responded, compared with 13 percent for Yushchenko's bloc, led by Our Ukraine.

That is three points behind the bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko, who served as his first prime minister until Yushchenko dismissed her last September amid mutual accusations of corruption.

Yanukovich's rebound is, in fact, less about his successes than Yushchenko's failings since he was inaugurated a year ago this month.

While is he often portrayed abroad as a reform-minded democrat seeking to realign Ukraine toward Europe and the United States, his reputation at home has suffered.

In the gas dispute, for example, Yushchenko appeared to have emerged victorious, having resisted Russia's demands for a nearly fivefold increase from the $50 per thousand cubic meters Ukraine was paying under a 2004 agreement. But critics soon pounced on the new deal, which set the price on average at $95, publicizing details that the government had not, including the fact that the price was fixed for only six months and is likely to rise again.

A week ago, Parliament voted to oust Yushchenko's prime minister and the rest of the government, while Yushchenko was in Kazakhstan, where he met with President Vladimir Putin to praise the gas deal as mutually beneficial to both countries.

The political turmoil has, for now, worsened his split with Tymoshenko, the charismatic populist whose public role in the Orange Revolution was second only to his.

Yanukovich, in contrast to Yushchenko, has succeeded in holding together his supporters, predominantly Russian speakers in the industrialized east and south, a geographical divide that Yushchenko has been unable to narrow.

In the 2004 election, Yanukovich had strong support from the Kremlin. He still vows not to change Ukraine's foreign policy at the expense of Russia, though he had to distance himself in the gas dispute.

Yushchenko's foreign minister, Boris Tarasyuk, contends that despite Yanukovich's seemingly stronger position, Ukrainians overwhelmingly support the course Yushchenko has set.

Vladyslav Kaskiv, who works as a presidential adviser, decided to run independently out of a belief that Ukrainian politics needed a new generation of leaders. Kaskiv was optimistic.

"Politics cannot return to what it was before," he said, articulating perhaps the greatest success of the Orange Revolution. "It could be better or worse, but it will be a democratic process."
 
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CHARTER

CHARTER OF MAIDAN VALUES

The peaceful, democratic and at the same time extremely stylish and beautiful Orange revolution did not end up during the days of Presidential elections. Free and thoughtful choice was important, first, but far not the last step in the program of democratic changes enabled by the sufferings by millions of Ukrainians.

Orange revolution was not a choice of personalities, whom the power was delegated. It was a choice of values on which the New Ukraine was to be built.  Millions went out to the streets to stand up not for their mercantile interests, but for the high ideals of Freedom, Democracy, Morality, Justice, and Citizens’ Dignity. The historic choice of Ukrainian nation proves that the rebirth of Ukraine can be achieved first of all by adhering to the values that were expressed in the slogans of Maidan:

Freedom ‘FREEDOM CANNOT BE STOPPED!’

Aspiration of citizens to self-realization and self-assertion, to reaching basic human rights may not be limited by any brutal force. The citizens are allowed everything that is not forbidden by the law.

The use of force, manipulations, intimidation, violations of law and disrespect of moral norms will not save any government from failure. Because such a power will never be supported by its people.

Democracy “TOGETHER WE ARE MANY! WE CANNOT BE OVERCOME!”

The people’s will is a source of legitimacy and efficiency of the government’s actions. In case of brutal disrespect of peoples’ will, people have a right to protest. The joint collective action by self-organized citizens, based on the peaceful and non-violent struggle for their rights, cannot be won by the cliques of the usurpers of power. Unification of the efforts of citizens and organizations into the joint political civic platform of cooperation is the guarantee of effective democratic control of those in power and prevention from the possible reemergence of an authoritarian regime.

Unity ‘EAST AND WEST – TOGETHER!’

Ukraine is a united country, although its citizens are distinguished through cultural, linguistic, religious, regional and ethnical diversity. The residents of Ukraine are UKRAINIANS, CITIZENS OF ONE STATE notwithstanding their political views, cultural orientations and regional identities. All those who incite to regional (religious, linguistic, ethnic, etc.) split should be condemned by the citizens and prosecuted by law.

Rule of Law ‘CRIMINALS – TO JAIL, PROTECTION TO HONEST!’

All political criminals, including the organizers of election fraud, must incur the deserved and irrevocable punishment. The society and government must go through the period of clearance from the previous experience of abandoning the law. Only the genuine clarification will end with a real affirmation of the rule of law as a really functioning and the only possible principle of justice, instead of its manipulation to satisfy the private interests of a few.

The facts of stealing of state property and finances have to find the reflection in the court sentences. Criminals may not remain in the power, and the system of governance shouldn’t create new criminals. The government is supposed to act only within its functions and in compliance with the Law.

Europeanism ‘EUROPEAN UKRAINE’

Ukraine belongs to the European continent not only in the geographical sense. It is truly European civilization, and even more, it carries a seed of the future Europe, a valuable impulse for the renewing of democracy.

Nowadays Ukraine has to assert its European identity, become an integral participant of social, political, and economical processes in Europe. Institutionally this is measured by attaining the membership and active participation in the leading integrative communities at the European and Euro-Atlantic area. This is a way to satisfy the national interests of Ukraine in the strategic perspective.   

Action ‘WE ARE GOING!’

The control over adherence to the Maidan values is overtaken by the new generation of Ukrainians, whose outlook has been formed in the era of Independence. The generation, which gives all its hopes to self-realization with irrevocability of democratic changes in Ukraine.

The Maidan values can only be really settled through the active citizens’ participation in the political and civic life.

IT IS TIME TO LIVE AND WORK FOR THE COMMON GOAL!

Adopted by the delegates of the Congress of Civic Party PORA

22 August, 2005, Square of Independence

 
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