Blue &Yellow: Politics and Economics in Ukraine

Officials from Ukraine’s Interior Ministry and the General Prosecutor’s Office issued contradictory statements on Oct. 25 when asked to explain the existence of nearly 13,000 extra election ballots. The ballots were uncovered by an opposition party over the weekend at a printing house in the eastern Ukrainian town of Kharkiv.The development follows a morning announcement that President Viktor Yanukovych had ordered his nation’s law enforcement authorities to investigate allegations by opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko, the former prime minister he defeated in the Feb. 7 presidential election.

Regions is safeguarding its victory in the local elections by printing extra ballots, article from the Kyiv Post. It seems to be following a two prong strategy of ballot stuffing and investigation the opposition to keep it on the defensive.

Opposition leaders are warning that Yanukovych could try to influence the upcoming vote with tricks like ballot-stuffing and coercion (in 2004, his presidential bid was annulled after his campaign was found guilty of widespread vote rigging). But Yanukovych may not need the artificial support. His party has been gaining ground since parliamentary elections in 2007, when the crippling ineffectiveness of the Orange coalition began to take its toll at the polls, says Regina Smyth, an Indiana University professor who studies elections in post-communist states.

I'm skeptical about this short Newsweek blurb claiming that people are voting for stability or that Regions has been gaining ground since the 2007 Rada elections. If that were true why did Regions tailor a local election law that favors them, alter the coalition so that individual MPs could join it, and strengthen the presidency (through a court decision). This actions suggest the party fears it could lose support and wishes to create structural changes that would discourage a strong opposition from emerging.

I'm not a constitutional lawyer so I really can't debate the particulars of the court's decision. But when you stand back, the perception in the West is, in 2004, with the support of over 400 members of the Rada (Ukraine's parliament), Ukraine adopted these constitutional changes and they've been implementing them for five years. And all of a sudden the constitutional court comes out and says, "Oops, we made a mistake"? The appearance, I think, is not good for Ukrainian democracy. It does look like Ukraine is moving backwards. And I think from the perspective of many in the West, while the reform situation produced in some ways gridlock - and you saw it in terms of the battles between the executive branch and the Rada over several years during the Yushchenko presidency - it had a greater balance of power between the Rada and the president, and it provided for some checks and balances. And it seems that the government now, or the president now, wishes to move away from that system. And I think that will cause concern in the West, both in the United States and Europe, about where democracy in Ukraine is going.

Radio Free Europe interviews (emphasis mine)  Steven Pifer, a Brookings fellow and former US Ambassador to Ukraine from 1998 to 2000. The move by the court certainty is a step back, I question is description of the post-2004 of one that "provided some checks and balances". It seemed like a system that encouraged delay, opacity,with the occasional rule breaking by both the president and the Rada.

 It's not going to be good for Ukraine's image, or for the image of the current government, if the first national election held after the presidential election in February is seen as dramatically worse in terms of democratic standards. That's not going to be good. My worry about it is that it then becomes harder to keep Western interest in Ukraine alive.

Pfier response to a slightly loaded question on the local elections, where  RFE points out the local election law favors the party in power.

 If Ukraine's new system was so dysfunctional, why didn't anyone change it before now? The problem was that no faction in the country's bitterly divided political system trusted any other faction to change the setup, fearing that reform would benefit one political group at the expense of all others. Thus when Yulia Tymoshenko, currently an opposition leader, proposed changes as prime minister, the attempts foundered.

The move back to a presidential system now will give Yanukovych powers Yushchenko lacked, allowing him to hire and fire ministers with far less interference from parliament.

By promoting calm, this could benefit all of Ukraine, though whether stability ultimately improves or not will depend on how Yanukovych follows up on the court's ruling. He has two options. He can either work with parliament to change the constitution -- the more promising path. Or he can unilaterally declare the previous 1996 constitution in effect, an approach guaranteed to fire up the opposition and estrange his coalition partners in parliament.

Nice summary of the court ruling earlier this month in Foreign Policy, but the I don't agree that there is a "calm" or that the change will "benefit all of Ukraine". The new president has shown a disdain for fair play and a preference for more authoritarian style of leadership. For those who think that this will somehow be good for the economy, lets take a look at Dani Rodriks article on authoritarianism and economic growth. 

Yanukovych did not displease his Russian guests, as during his speech he never once mentioned Ukraine’s desire to join the EU. Instead, he said that Ukraine “will choose the speed, form and methods of integration that conform to its national interests” (Ukrayinska Pravda, October 4). Yanukovych is the first of four Ukrainian presidents to avoid supporting efforts to join NATO or to publicly endorse joining the EU. Yanukovych has repeatedly ignored requests by the G7 Ambassadors for a meeting in Kyiv (Ukrayinska Pravda, October 11).

Taras Kuzio writing about Russian influence on Ukrainian foreign policy.  Toe be fair, Russia also successfully lobbied other countries to make it unlikely that NATO would offer Ukraine a MAP. As for the EU, even if Yanukovych wanted to join the EU, would the EU be ready to include a country the size of Ukraine right now?

The conditions of the privatization of a state stake in OSJC Ukrtelecom make the largest holding in the country SCM and Russian telecommunications group MTS the most likely buyers of the stake, according to analysts polled by Interfax-Ukraine.

According to the conditions of the Ukrtelecom's privatization approved by the government on Tuesday, companies which income over the previous financial year exceeding 25% of total income of Ukrainian operators seen over the said period cannot bid for the 92.79% stake in Ukrtelecom with the initial price of UAH 10.5 billion.

Why do I think SCM will be the winner?

Still, Tymoshenko went on, it would be wrong to boycott the elections as it will show the weakness of Batkivshchyna.

Tymoshenko proposed to appeal to the Council of Europe, asking it to react to vote-rigging tactics of the regime.

Probably will be rigged, but can be done? The new president has shown his capable of undoing quite a bit in just a few months in office.

"There must and will be the supremacy of law in Ukraine. This is the main principle of democracy. Any decision by a court, let alone Constitutional, must be complied with by the President, the Cabinet and the Verkhovna Rada," the head of state told a press conference led jointly with Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski in the Livadia Palace in Yalta on Friday.

President Yanukovych quoted after the Constitutional Court cancelled the 2004 political reforms put in place when his predecessor won. The court remained completely silent on this issue during Yushchenko's presidency, yet miraculously the court cancels the amendments for President Yanukovych. And slowly president Yanukovych returns Ukraine to the managed democracy under Kuchma with a weak press and a controlled Rada. If Tymoshenko's party wins a majority in the next Rada elections the president would have the upper hand in that relationship.