Rada: Are you working?

EDM (Volume 6, Issue 169) brings up an issue that President Yushchenko brought up as well, the Rada hasn't gotten back to work. Yatsenuik also commented on the Rada's behavior in Interfax-Ukraine.

Asked how he is planning to cooperate with the current parliament if he is elected president, Yatseniuk said that he saw no chance to oblige the Verkhovna Rada to work with its current staff.

"I've been in politics for a long time, but I've never seen such a level of cynicism as in [this] parliament," he said.

Yatseniuk said that the parliament had currently turned into a "clannish-oligarchic structure" and a law firm for oligarchs.


Since he was the former speaker of the Rada, his observations are relevant, but I question his comments that his never seen this much cynicism. I'm sure that there was plenty of cynicism in politics during the Soviet Union

Meanwhile, EDM looks at the Rada and how the presidential election is affecting its work. The Party of Regions was blocking the podium before the summer recess and it seems that the party has chosen to stick with this strategy. As the article notes, Regions has adopted a populist tone, something that's been noted here, in a cynical attempt to drum up support from voters.
It is an open secret that the PRU is attempting
to fool its potential voters. One Ukrainian weekly noted that PRU
members are not interested in increasing pensions and wages, as
most of them are businessmen who are not ready to pay their
employees more (Zerkalo Nedeli, September 12). However, by
advocating this policy the PRU is not risking anything,
understanding that its demands will not be met by Tymoshenko
because of the economic crisis. The BYT is not willing to accept
the PRU's conditions not only due to the economic situation, but
also since Tymoshenko apparently believes that the blockade of
parliament works against her main rival in the election campaign.
According to her team's findings, Yanukovych is losing potential
voters because of the blockade, while Tymoshenko may use the
blockade to her advantage by claiming that the PRU actually makes
the approval of higher social standards impossible by disrupting
the legislative process (Segodnya, September 15).
At least for now the Party of Regions populist tone has worked or at least not hurt the party. Yanukovych reminds the front runner in the presidential election, granted the economic crisis has done much to damage Tymoshenko and Yushchenko (whose ratings were already low before the crisis). Tymoshenko's party is taking a gamble that Regions blocking of the Rada will backfire on it.

Perhaps the stand off shouldn't have been unforeseen considering that the president can longer disband the Rada. The parties can now ignore the president's plea and focus on priority one, the presidential election. Meanwhile, Regions continues to push ahead on populist measures and others are supporting them in hopes of unblocking the Rada.
at Monday, September 21, 2009

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