Enemies Within Ukraine

“With friends like that, who needs enemies?” A common adage that many have heard more than once when someone earlier considered a friend betrayed a person. The theme of treason has to be brought to the fore in contemporary Ukrainian society that has far too many enemies within. When the USSR began to crumble in the late 1980s and finally collapsed in 1991, there was a great deal of work Ukraine needed to do in order to ensure the transition from a command to market economy. That took much longer than it should have for many reasons, though there was even a more damning factor which retarded Ukraine’s development in my opinion. With Ukraine’s independence referendum on December 1, 1991 things took time to change, particularly the rewriting of the old laws of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. 

Some of Ukraine’s first enemies within appeared in 1993 when the sitting Verkhovna Rada voted for Law Number 3623-12. In particular it was Paragraph 2, of Article 2, which reads: “A Deputy can be chosen by a citizen of Ukraine, who has the right to vote, and cannot be less that 25 years of age on the day of elections”. The stipulation to become a deputy under Soviet law was the age of majority, which in Ukraine is 18 years of age. 

I consider those deputies and Leonid Kravchuk, president of the day, as enemies of Ukraine. In passing that law, they shut out the youth of Ukraine who had sacrificed their health and well being during the Revolution on Granite, which marked it’s 30th anniversary this year from October 2nd through 17th. What was Zelensky thinking on July 30th of this year when he appointed octogenarian Leonid Kravchuk, modern Ukraine’s first elected president, to be the head of the delegation of the Minsk Trilateral Contact  Group on the peaceful settlement on the situation in Donbas. 

I believe Zelensky seems to be out of touch with the realities of Ukraine and seems to have little respect for Ukrainians and Ukraine’s history. That lack of respect stems back to 2010, when his comedy program mockingly used the Holodomor in one of their sketches. The lack of empathy for this historic fact has often been ignored and dismissed by Zelensky and his team of his groomers have taught him how to skirt his past and act presidential. Unfortunately, there is nothing presidential about his behaviour and actions, nor is much respect shown for the Ukrainian language by his string of candidates running in local elections on October 25, 2020 from his Servant of the People’s party. Since the day of his inauguration, I’ve wondered, “Which people he and his party members are serving?” 

Ignorance, Indifference and Disrespect

Billboard and election literature of many different the party’s candidates are fraught with Google Translate errors, and Russian-isms. Many of these errors are ones that Ukraine’s elementary school pupils could easily pick out and laugh at.  In preparing their election campaign materials, candidates are required to follow the party’s brand book. This book acts as a guide for many things, from the colors they can or can not use to standard templates for all their published materials. However I wonder where’s the gray matter between the ears of the candidates when it comes to using language. A number of these cock-ups started appearing on social media quite regularly within hours after billboards appeared, and within days of the official start of the campaign on September 5, 2020. 

The one that first caught my eye within the first two weeks of the election campaign was the campaign poster of a Servant of the People’s candidate running in the Obolon district of Kyiv, who took hyperbole to the level of absurdity. Yevheniy Vandin’s poster reads: “We will make Obolon the Capital of Kyiv.” So I wonder if Mr. Vandin even has a clue of the meaning of the word “capital”. The definition of the
word I know is as follows: “n. 1. The capital city of a country or town of a country, state, etc.; seat of government”. As journalist and popular Ukrainian blogger, Maria Madzigon said in a video on the same topic on October 15: “You should have attended your geography classes, Vandin Yevheniy!”

While the foolish mistakes by native Russian speakers is quite understandable, the error of their linguistic ways will clearly reveal to astute voters where their sympathies truly lie. However, when it comes to the former comedian Zelensky the language and form of address he used to the citizens of Ukraine is totally unacceptable. To readers who have studied languages other than English, I’m certain you are aware of the two different forms of the pronoun you. Ukrainian is one those languages that used the two different forms. The common form ty, which would be tu in French as an analogy, and the more formal form vy, or vous in French. Though this really wasn’t Zelensky’s fault – his fault in fact was that he was addressing more than one individual – the citizens of Ukraine and in doing so he should have used vy or in French this would be vous.

The address in question has to do with Zelensky’s way of obfuscating the real problems that Ukrainians should be asking their president right now and this is verbatim what he said, “Hello! Yes, yes, I am directly addressing you [in the singular form], on October 25th at the polls, I will be giving you five important questions. By the way what will be the questions, about this later.” By now citizens of Ukraine have heard these five questions that will be not part of the balloting process as Ukraine’s electoral law does not have a provision for carrying this out during elections. However, as explained by the Presidential Administration, the five questions will be posed to voters outside the polling stations by pollsters from a private polling firm. If so, to quote a post of a good friend mine, Oleksandr Chernenko’s [VRU member 2014-2019, political expert, journalist] Facebook page on October 13, 2020:  “Why is the president involved in this at all?  If the "poll" is a private initiative, then why does Zelensky announce it? If it is an initiative of the president, then which law or which article of the Constitution provides for such powers? After all, he, as an official, must act exclusively within his powers. Everything else is an abuse of power.” 

Health issues at this time are a problem throughout Ukraine, and the questions that Zelensky had no damn business in stepping beyond his prescribed duties as the questions he has posed are nothing but a smoke screen for his administration’s incompetence and corruption. Of the the 65 billion hryvnia earmarked to fight the pandemic, 35 million of this was transferred to the Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine, for pet projects such as road construction, while the people of Ukraine suffer. According to the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine’s Corona epidemic monitoring system Ukraine has had 303,648 confirmed cases of the illness; 5,673 deaths; 126,489 recoveries; 171,476 existing and a suspicion of 373,276 illnesses [https://covid19.rnbo.gov.ua/].

Questions to Zelensky

A day after Chernenko’s statements of October 14, Madzigon addressed Zelensky’s use of language as I did above and she also pointed out to Zelensky, that in a democracy it is not the president who should be asking questions of the country’s citizens, but it is they who should be asking him the questions. With that as a prelude she began with addressing some extremely poignant questions, while also addressing Zelensky’s election campaign promises, most of which he has not even come close to accomplishing. Before I continue with some of the questions she posed, let me add this about democracy and democracy building, something I’ve been involved in for more than three decades. Democracy isn’t just about going to polling stations to exercise one’s franchise. Democracy is about holding those the electorate has voted for accountable for their actions or inaction. This is just what Madzigon does and I will for you touch on just a few of her questions and statements below:

    • Why did it cost your administration 12 billion to construct 30 km of highway, while under Poroshenko that same money build 80 km. Thirty and eighty do you recognize the difference?;

    • Why did you spend the money from the anti-Corona virus fund, from the anti-Corona virus fund not for a battle against the pandemic but for roads? It’s brilliant! [she says while clapping];

    • Why under Zelensky, under you, has the clear cutting of forests increased seven-fold?

    • Why was the law on land passed without going through a referendum?;

    • Why did you? You promised us that you would do everything without nepotism, and more than thirty of your friends in some way received positions. How do you explain this?;

    • Why out of all of Ukraine’s previous presidents do you have the largest motorcade of 52 cars. Think about it? Fifty-two. I'm already silent about twenty guards around;

    • Why is Medvedchuk free? Why is Medvedchuk still free?;

    • Why didn’t you declare five million in income? In general, this is a violation of the law, you yourself said that you would resign once you violated the law. 

While we will never know what Zelensky’s response would be to these questions one thing is clear Madzigon’s video in English translation is called: “WHAT WAS THAT??? #fivequestions” and clearly she touched a nerve with at least 14K Facebook users sharing the video and 954 users making comments. 

I’m sure readers can well imagine that how users would have responded in their comments. One comment was as follows: “It makes no sense to ask Zelensky questions, because we saw his inappropriate behavior, false primitive answers and hysterical laughter when he was asked questions by British journalist Stephen Sackur.” This is in reference to Zelensky’s interview on HARDtalk, during his state visit to the UK. Watch and see if you agree with the comment made by one of Madzigon’s followers.

There was one question she asked which touches a nerve in me more than any other. “Why is Medvedchuk still free?” Ukraine watchers who understand the notoriety of Viktor Medvedchuk in the case of dissident Vasyl Stus, who was sent to the Gulag never to return, may have the same sentiments that I have to the “great traitor”! Medvedchuk, in my opinion, was always a crony of the Soviet system, and clearly raised in the spirit of the Komsomol and the Communist Party. I can not remember where I may have either read or heard that as the Soviet Union was collapsing, there were orders from the Kremlin, that Komsomol members must find a way to create a niche in the new reality that was upon them. In short, this meant that they must pillage what they can in order to become wealthy and Medvedchuk did so in Ukraine, just like many of those mentioned in Chrystia Freeland’s book The Sale of the Century did in Russia in the early 1990s. 

Then and Now: Medvedchuk vs Kipiani

While I’ve never met Viktor Medvedchuk, though his behavior in working close to Leonid Kuchma, never invoked any confidence that he was working for the good of Ukraine and its people. Both he and Kuchma ingratiated themselves through their official positions during Kuchma’s two consecutive terms in office. On the other hand, I met Vakhtang Kipiani in the summer of 2003 a number of months after he had become the host and editor-in-chief of a program called  Podviyniy dokaz [Double proof] on the 1+1 television channel. We met at the Writers House at 2 Bankova in Kyiv, with a group of other Ukrainian journalists. At the time I was working in local print media, and as a foreign radio broadcaster for Ukrainian Time, the oldest Ukrainian-Canadian broadcast based out of Montreal. Though what really tied us together the most was our different types of involvement in the Revolution on Granite, in short we are both part of the same brotherhood. Since then I’ve been a friend of Kipiani’s and have followed him in his historical research particularly on the Istorychna Pravda [Historical Truth] website and most recently the YouTube channel of the same name. 

In 2019, after a great deal of research Kipiani published a book on the entire legal procedures against Ukrainian dissident Vasyl Stus [1935-1985], in which Medvedchuk was supposed to be acting in Stus’ defense, though Stus refused his him as a lawyer, which was within his legal rights, though Medvedchuk continued to act as his public defender, against his client’s will. 

Kipiani based his publication on archival material and presented facts.  The complete title translated is as follows: Characteristics of the case of Vasyl Stus. Collection of documents from the archives of the former KGB of the USSR. Then the good old defender of Ukrainians Medvedchuk, got a little pissed and decide to take both Kipiani and his publisher, Vivat, to court in order to ban the books’ publication and distribution. In particular Medvedchuk took offense with one chapter of the book that he considered to degrade his honour and dignity. 

On October 19, 2020 the Darnytsia District Court in Kyiv handed down their decision against Kipiani and his publisher Vivat, and the must cease publication and distribution of this book. The entire legal process has possibly backfired on the “great traitor”.  The court decision had a definite impact on the sale of the book and it may just backfire on “enemy number one of Ukraine”. Kipiani wrote the following two significant comments on his Facebook page. During the afternoon he posted the following: “ I received 157 phone calls today. I didn't have time to react to the majority of them, I'm sorry. Four radio broadcasts plus three television interviews, plus a dozen comments for media. (It's hard to be a superstar, yeah) P.S. In the evening, Facebook also forbade me writing comments and replying in Messenger, because it thinks that I produce spam 😉. Thank you to everyone for their support. Hugs to you all.  I love Ukraine.” About three hours later he posted the following: “More than a thousand people wrote to me in  Messenger about the book. I managed to answer somewhere in the hundreds. After that, the system began to issue an explanation that in order to protect against spam, my ability to respond is suspended. Though they did not say for how long. It may be some type of beacon. But please be patient - I will answer everyone.” 

While much of Medvedchuk’s position in “defending” Stus is in the past and when he was but 26 years old working in Soviet system, dealing with dissidents, few know that his father was considered a Nazi collaborator and maybe his motivation to collaborate with the KGB in order to pay back a debt to the Soviet. That aside. Let’s look at his current behavior and who he is. 

At the current moment Medvedchuk leads a political party that calls itself the Opposition Platform – For Life. The history of this “platform” has been nothing but a manner of disrupting Ukraine’s democratic and economic development. I have no other word than “douche bag” for the members of this party that is in the pocket of the Kremlin. Let’s not forget that Putin is the “godfather” of Medvedchuk’s daughter, and this is the greatest form of nepotism. 

A Possible Key Response

The following is what was reported by RFE/RL regarding the Presidential Administration’s response to the court decision: 

"Most of the content of the book is an exact reprint of the criminal case. That is, the purely documentary basis of the book does not cause the slightest doubt. Thus, it is by this logic of the book that VV Medvedchuk is a participant in a real process that took place in history, and not just a "character of the work." The participant's behavior is analyzed solely on the basis of documented facts, which are not a product of the authors' literary work and literary fiction.”

At the moment it seems like an appropriate response from Zelensky’s administration, that still has many questions to answer. Maybe they are listening on such a politically charged historical issues to the point that they understand that these things matter to many culturally aware Ukrainians, be they in Ukraine or beyond its borders.

I hope readers take the time to read the hyperlinks. As a professional librarian I love to provide value added information to the things I write. Particularly to what is close to my heart and soul. The questions posed by Maria Madzigon are all valid! My one wish now is that all Ukrainians who read English and have learnt something new will share all this information with their colleagues, family and friends. 

 
Vasyl Pawlowsky 

Independent Consultant

Bigger sticks and carrots, for some

A number of weeks ago I was asked to write an OP-ED piece for ePOSHTA. Since then there have been echoes of some of the ideas I have expressed here. Including from my friend Myroslava Gongadze in the Kyiv Post. Given that some time has passed, and the publisher of ePOSHTA had told me of some technical problems, I am publishing this here.

For years, Ukraine has been going through mock reforms and in my opinion they always seems they do so as a knee-jerk response to something that is troubling the West. In short it always seems to be not a carrot that works but a fairly large stick, somewhere along the lines of a two-by-four. During the entire Presidency of Viktor Yuschenko, it seems like no approach whatsoever was taken, and most of the world looked to Ukraine as the poster-child of democracy and it slowly made some progress, though much of it was in fact window-dressing. Yushchenko's crusader like attitude towards the Holodomor, was great, but what else if anything regarding Ukraine's future was accomplished?

Ukraine's poster-child status was deserved, but somehow, the West is also partially respsonsible for Yushchenko's demise, and never held up a big enough stick to neither Yuschenko nor to Tymoshenko who because of their ego's could never put the interest of the nation first. In the not so distant past, one of the biggest sticks that was always held over Ukraine's head was the Jackson-Vanik Ammendment which was lifted in November of 2005.

This was an important change, particularly to US-Ukraine relations regarding trade; however, the promises of the “orange leaders” from upon the Maydan, never materialized, and no one was held to their promises. Though this is not only a problem in Ukraine's democracy, but in all democracies. Somehow, it seemed to me as well as friends at the Democratic Initiatives Foundation, that Ukrainians had come to think that democracy is about elections, and they had forgotten the most important period is really the inter-election period. Regardless of where we live, we are all too familiar with what the majority of politicians will tell their electorate in order to get elected. I will not delve into the period that I have heard some coin the “orange honeymoon”, but would like people to think about what has been happening in the last few months and more particularly since Ukraine's reversion to the 1996 version of Ukraine's Constitution in October of 2010.

One of the greatest matters that will strike a cord with any long-term Ukraine watchers and advocates of democratic progress and development is that the Rule of Law is essential!

The disregard for any law in Ukraine, has during its nearly twenty years of independence, been commonplace, unfortunately as are commonly excepted principles between what is right and wrong when dealing with businessmen and more particularly civil servants, who 90% of the time put their personal interests before those required by the positions they are supposed to carry out! The contempt of the law, seems to have been happening even more now than under what some political activists in Ukraine called Kuchmizm, in the period leading up to the Orange Revolution.

While I do not condone violent uprising in Ukraine as a way of bringing about the needed changes, it is a prospect that seems to become increasingly realistic if the current authoritarian trends continue to be exerted further and further. People are now being pushed and jostled a little harder than Kuchma dared to push! The decisively anti-national, and socio-economically erosive policies are in fact, riling people in Ukraine to the point that I have not once on various Ukrainian fora seen it being asserted that peaceful means of resistance are no longer considered to be a viable option.

As pointed out by the publisher of ePOSHTA, Myroslava Oleksyuk on a discussion list which prompted me to write this piece, “Former ambassador Dr. Yuri Shcherbak confirmed this when he was in Toronto last month. He believes the situation will not be changed without violence.”
However, given the current state of the Ukrainian national psyche (see analysis in Oleh Tolkachov’s article in Ukrainska Pravda), such drastic developments may, even now, seem to be hard to imagine.” 

The reprisals of arrest of those who are considered oppositional forces, has even lead to some condemnation by some in the West, while the government in Ukraine, claims that these arrests are not politically motivated. However, how can one believe anyone leading a country where the rule of law does not exist?

One of the greatest problem in Ukraine is what I would call a leadership vacuum. There is neither a viable leader nor a group that have completely clean hands. So many deals in Ukraine are made or broken on compromise. Until such a group appears on the scene that is without compromise and one that not only has leadership and vision but one that knows how to channel to the population a vision of Ukraine the country will remain a place that is economically plundered by a few, while the greater portion of the population eeks out an existence. This group must not only have wide appeal, it must be ready to take on a leadership role including a long term strategy for the nation, and then, and only then will it be possible to move in the right direction! A direction, that appeals not only to Ukrainians living in Ukraine, but those who live beyond Ukraine's borders and includes patriotic Ukrainian values not only of Ukrainian citizens, but those of the Ukrainian diaspora. Individuals who collectively have a better understanding of democracy than most Ukrainians in Ukraine. This may in fact still take a generation or two, and I know it's not as quick as we would like to see Ukraine change for the better, but is the closest realistic scenario.But there is the chance, that no such leader or group will ever appear?

Even for this to happen in my predicted time-frame, Ukraine has to develop a clear national policy on where it wants to go and to be led by individuals and groups who stop putting their personal interests first and put the interests of the country before their own. The indecisiveness of the nation, has existed since Ukraine gained its independence in 1991, and because of this indecisiveness that the phrase, “We have what we have!” by Leonid Kravchuk will continue to stick in the minds of many Ukrainians.

One of the main problems which Ukraine and Ukrainians in the diaspora face right now is one very absolute fact. The powers that be in Ukraine,at this moment in time, will use all means possible to marginalize the role of the diaspora. They, along with those who have their favor, may either willingly, or unwillingly, sow the seeds of conflict in our communities! Nearly a year ago, in some fora, stated that we must remain vigilant and this has not changed. In fact we must be even more vigilant!

We must focus on a positive and professional approach in the projects we pursue and to do this we must also pursue approaches to carrying out projects that will not always be congruous with the mindset of many of our community leaders, many who unfortunately are there by default and not because of leadership or vision!

Since, I have returned to live in Canada, in 2009, I have heard and seen countless examples of low level of professionalism in our community. As one friend and fellow broadcaster has said, on numerous occasions, “There are many Ukrainians who are top professionals in their fields, but once they are in the church hall, the local SUM or Plast branch, their professionalism is left at the door!” Think about it for a moment, and I am sure that you all know a few people who are just like that. Our communities somehow too, lack a vision, and when someone does voice their opinion and put forth a vision they are put down by those who are at the helm of our various communities around the globe.

While, this is not always the case with our national organizations who have a budget to operate and have in the past and still do hire extremely qualified individuals, this does not happen at the regional levels. There, nearly everyone has a mindset that non-profit organizations making money to be self-supportive in furthering their cause, and the cause of the community at large is somehow a bad thing. It is is simply not true. All organizations have a board, which often is for the most part slapped together pell-mell and made up of members who are their by default. Many younger people in the community have become disenfranchised by the community, because a resistance to change by older members. I'm not talking about older being octogenarians, I'm talking about many of my own peers who are in their forty-somethings. The status-quo is good enough for them, so therefore it must be alright for everyone else. Is it?

I'm not sure why this is the case, but it is a problem that the community has to figure out how to deal with. Maybe, it's lack of creativity, or maybe simply it is their insular vision, that hampers them in realizing what is truly going on in Ukraine and even in their own back yards. Or maybe it is that they are not in touch with the world in general? Meanwhile, adversaries of Ukrainian nationhood and culture are doing everything and using all contemporary means possible to discredit both Ukraine and Ukrainians wherever they reside on the face of this earth.

I am certain that there are many who have forgotten the days, when the world was fed a great deal of political rhetoric about how things are so good in Ukraine. It is possible that the same people and those who in Ukraine's nearly twenty years of independence have somehow forgotten, or never learned to read between the lines in all spheres of contemporary Ukrainian life, and began to see Ukraine through rose colored glasses once it gained its independence. Why is this? It is my opinion, that they and others like them have never fully understood the root of many of the problems and undercurrents in Ukraine.

When I visited Ukraine for the first two times in 1990, I too had a certain expected perception of what the country would be like. Though my perception over the last twenty years has developed to be a more realistic one. A Ukraine with problems that most Canadians, Americans and Europeans can not even fathom or begin to understand, because many have simply been tourists, and business people who seldom shown or told about the realities of Ukraine.

So may I propose for 2011 that the entire Ukrainian community that is concerned about Ukraine, as an independent nation, rethink their approaches not only to Ukraine, but to our communities.

For Ukraine, our leadership has to lobby at an official level with tenacity and willingness to ensure that bigger sticks are used in keeping Ukraine in line in the area of human rights, press freedoms, and most importantly the rule of law. Somehow, it seems that anytime Ukraine cries about its problems the world comes to the rescue with assistance in the form of a blank cheque. That blank cheque and any other assistance, including bilateral trade agreements in the future, requires not only strings attached, but iron chains.

For our communities, we have to think about the younger people in the community who want to try something new, different and innovative. Some of their ideas may even be considered risky, by conservative members of the community, but if it contributes to the common good, then we must nurture a younger generation, many, who have turned their backs on the community and not without reason!. To those individuals in the community who can contribute in a positive way be it in their actions or financially to do so, and the youth and supporters of innovative community projects should be given carrots, so they continue to do so.

Journalists and broadcasters, must professionally inform not only the Ukrainian community globally about important issues, but also politicians, the media and common individuals who are not indifferent to Ukraine or its people, history or culture regardless of where in the world they are. We should in turn demand that the international community carry a bigger stick when it comes to dealing with Ukraine, as opposed to them responding to their mock reforms and lack of adherence to rule of law and human rights. The carrot, is of a color which the current regime holds a disdain for, will not work in initiating any change in Ukraine. They need to be not only beaten with a two-by-four by the international community, but society within Ukraine, must learn how to beat those who do not live by the rule of law with not only a two-by-four, but with the iron that comes out of foundries of those who have become wealthy beyond belief.

I would like to close with my best wishes to you all readers of E-Poshta with my very best wishes for 2011, and to hope that together we can demonstrate to others that we can work effectively together and be agents of change within the global Ukrainian community!