Blue &Yellow: Politics and Economics in Ukraine

Umberto Eco recently talked about lists as "origin of culture",  this is what he said on lists in an interview in Spiegel. 

Umberto Eco: The list is the origin of culture. It's part of the history of art and literature. What does culture want? To make infinity comprehensible. It also wants to create order -- not always, but often. And how, as a human being, does one face infinity? How does one attempt to grasp the incomprehensible? Through lists, through catalogs, through collections in museums and through encyclopedias and dictionaries. There is an allure to enumerating how many women Don Giovanni slept with: It was 2,063, at least according to Mozart's librettist, Lorenzo da Ponte. We also have completely practical lists -- the shopping list, the will, the menu -- that are also cultural achievements in their own right.
SPIEGEL: Should the cultured person be understood as a custodian looking to impose order on places where chaos prevails?
Eco: The list doesn't destroy culture; it creates it. Wherever you look in cultural history, you will find lists. In fact, there is a dizzying array: lists of saints, armies and medicinal plants, or of treasures and book titles. Think of the nature collections of the 16th century. My novels, by the way, are full of lists.

Yanukovych would have received 28.5% of the vote if the election had been held on December 20 while Yuschenko would have mustered a mere 3.5%, according to the returns of a December 17-22 survey by political sociology company FOM-Ukraine released at a news conference at Interfax-Ukraine on Monday.

Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who is also running, would have won 14.4% of votes.

From Interfax-Ukraine (emphasis mine), Yanukovych remains front-runner, while Tymoshenko seems to be losing support among voters. A poll from November had her at 25%. Here's the breakdown of the FOM-Ukraine poll. 

"So what did this Orange Revolution give us?," Yanukovych asked in an interview Monday with The Associated Press. "Freedom of speech? That's very good. But what price did the Ukrainian people pay for this? For the development of this democratic principle in our country, the price was too great."

Democracy is "above all the rule of law," which the Orange Revolution has failed to bring, he said.

Since taking power in 2005 on a wave of hope and excitement, the revolution's leaders have disappointed many Ukrainians, fostering nostalgia among some for the stable, if autocratic, rule of an earlier era. 

A follow up to this post, as one can see Yanukovych has been emboldened by his strong showing in the presidential election. His making no attempt to hide his dislike for democracy or democratic principles. However, I disagree with the journalist claim that there is a feeling of nostalgia by the public for the Kuchma era. Its not the public that wants autocratic rule, that's pure nonsense. Its the political losers from the Orange Revolution.

The new government must act within weeks to satisfy International Monetary Fund demands to stick to budget pledges. The absence of political leadership .... delayed payment of part of a $30 billion IMF-led loan. Standard & Poor’s has warned the vacuum may trigger credit-rating downgrades.

No, its not an article about Ukraine. Its a Bloomberg article about Romania. 

• This is the logo for Euro 2012, image from an AFP article.[AFP]
•  An op-ed piece from the NY Times about the presidential election. [NYT]
• Rada leaves for vacation, returns 19th January. [Pravda]
• The IMF isn't budging from its position on Ukraine, its denied Ukraine's request for a $2 billion loan. [FT] 

From The Economist, while I disagree with the description of Ukraine as a "healthy democracy" (their reasoning--no one can predict the winner, but there are only two contenders), yes the next five years will be hard for Ukraine. It didn't just squander goodwill, but also a chance to further reform the economy.  As the excerpt above illustrates, little was done when the economy was going well, why would there be an impetus now to do something? However, the next president will have many issues on their plate including: Black sea fleet, EU, NATO, Russia, and the economy.  Perhaps if the economy continues to deteriorate, the new president will do what Kuchma did and name a technocrat reformer as prime minister, but who hopefully won't run for the presidency in five years. 

Via FT Alphaville, Ukraine is the second riskiest sovereign borrower after Venezuela. 

The 50-year-old former prime minister and national bank chief was sworn in as Ukraine's third president since the collapse of the Soviet Union 13 years ago, capping a bitter but joyous campaign for office and for democracy that erupted in November when the outgoing regime of Leonid Kuchma tried to steal the presidential election. In scenes reminiscent of the popular ferment of 1989 that ended the Kremlin's rule over half of Europe, Yushchenko Sunday addressed more than 100,000 supporters who braved subzero temperatures in Kiev's central square to mark the birth of a new era. "This is a victory of freedom over tyranny, of law over lawlessness," Yushchenko declared.

Well, with Yanukovych ahead in the polls, though many voters are still undecided, its worth looking at the Ukrainska Pravda report on a poll recently conducted on changing the status of Russian language in Ukraine. A plurality, 41.2%, don't think its necessary to change the status of Russian. However,  35.8% of the respondents support making Russian an official state language, while 20.4% support Russian as a regional language in Ukraine. There is a sliver of respondents, 2.6%, who don't favor recognition. 

Mr Nemyria’s warning seems aimed at putting public pressure on the IMF, the US and the European Union at a difficult time in financial markets. Concern about the stability of emerging economies has been aggravated by the turmoil surrounding Dubai, following Dubai World’s surprise decision to seek a debt restructuring.

Update: But then perhaps Greece's economic woes may influence the IMF's decision on Ukraine.

A total of 39.6% of pollees said they already know a politician ‘able to be a good head of state and they will vote only for him’.

In other words approximately 61% of the electorate is still undecided with a month before the presidential election, according to this post from For-UA. Meanwhile 20% plan to vote for the least worse candidate, who can that be? According to the election calendar, January 2nd is when the ban on polling information starts, so we still have a few weeks for the electorate to make up its mind. 

• It doesn't deal with Ukraine, but this article from The Economist does discuss China "filling the power vacuum" in eastern Europe.[The Economist]
• Moody's on the Ukrainian banking system. [Interfax-UA]
• James Marson writes on the winners of the Orange revolution--the bandits. [The Guardian]
• Euro-2012 plans in Ukraine still a mess. [UNIAN]
• Putin not "backing" Tymoshenko for president. [Reuters]