18-year struggle ends

Historical justice has finally triumphed. After lengthy efforts on the part of progressively-minded Ukrainians, Kamianets-Po­dilsky University has been renamed in honor of its first rector Ivan Ohiienko, the outstanding Ukrainian statesman, public and cultural figure, and scholar. The Day was the first newspaper in Ukraine to broach this subject in an article entitled “The history of a name” ((March 30, 2004).

An annotation to this article predicted that the story surrounding the renaming of the university would finally be brought to an end because the educational institution was ready to accept the new name. Even one year earlier, in 2003, a Cabinet of Ministers resolution granted Kamianets-Podilsky University the status of a classical institution of higher learning but without naming it after Ivan Ohiienko.

REVIVING OHIIENKO’S NAME A MATTER OF NATIONAL HONOR

The happy news about the renaming of the university is tinged with sadness. Why did it take so much time and effort to carry out this entirely just and understandable action? Here is a bit of history.

In 1990 the council of the Faculty of Philology of what was then the Kamianets-Podilsky Teacher-Training Institute appealed to the highest government bodies to convert the institution to a university named after Ivan Ohiienko. Two years later, after overcoming numerous obstacles, above all, the resistance of pro-communist professors, the university held a scholarly conference on “The Spiritual, Scholarly, and Pedagogical Activities of Ivan Ohiienko (1882-1972),” the first of its kind in Ukraine.

The conference’s recommendations were sent to various government bodies, including the Cabinet of Ministers and the Ministry of Education and Science (MES). The institute’s Academic Council then passed a resolution on the reorganization of the university and submitted the necessary documents to Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers. The creation of the Ivan Ohiienko All-Ukrainian Society on May 27, 1992, led to a campaign during which hundreds of signatures of teachers and students were collected in support of the idea to rename the institution.

The ice began to break only in March 1998, when President Leonid Kuchma of Ukraine instructed Minister of Education M. Zhurovsky to submit a proposal on naming Kamianets-Podilsky and Dnipropetrovsk universities af­ter Ivan Ohiienko and Oles Hon­char, respectively (Literaturna Ukraina, March 26, 1998). Un­fortunately, the university administrators proved unable to carry out the president’s instruction. The Ministry of Education was none too keen on it either. In other words, the authorities had given their permission, but their subordinates (the university ad­mi­nistrators) were either dozing or afraid of something.

In 2001 the appointment as rector of Kamianets-Podilsky Pe­da­gogical University of Olek­sandr Zavalniuk, a well-known Ohiienko scholar and member of the society’s board, provided fresh impetus. The first session of the academic board resolved to mark the 120th birth anniversary of Ivan Ohiienko, the university’s founder, and install a commemorative plaque on the facade of the main building.

When Ohiienko’s 125th an­niver­sary was approaching, the board sent another request to the head of state, which stated: “Ta­king into account Ivan Ohiienko’s immense contribution to the national renaissance of Ukraine in the early 20th century, the founding of a national university in Podillia, the importance of his scholarly and spiritual legacy for contemporary Ukraine, and the forthcoming jubilee, the 125th anniversary of his birth, we are requesting you, esteemed Mr. President, to issue the decree ‘On New Measures to Mark the 125th Birth Anniversary of the Emi­nent State and Civic Figure Ivan Ohiienko-Metropolitan Ila­rion’ (the draft is attached).”

At last, on Feb. 7, 2007, President Yushchenko issued the decree “On Honoring the Memory of Ivan Ohiienko” and instructed the Cabinet of Ministers “to study the question of naming certain research and educational institutions in honor of Ivan Ohiienko.”

Unfortunately, the Cabinet of Ministers did not act on the decree throughout 2007, although time was pressing: Kamianets-Po­dil­sky University was about to mark its 90th birthday in 2008.

UKRAINE’S FIRST LADY TO THE RESCUE

Using my position as city counselor, I circulated a city council petition to the Cabinet of Ministers (Yulia Tymoshenko), the Ministry of Education (Ivan Vakarchuk), and the Khmelnytsky Oblast Administration (I. Havchuk), again raising the question of naming Kamianets-Podilsky National University after Ivan Ohiienko.

The 5th-convocation Kamianets-Podilsky City Council, which mostly consists of patriotically-minded members, passed Resolution No. 11 at its 27th session on Feb. 27, 2008: “To approve the text of the Kamianets-Podilsky City Council petition on naming Kamianets-Podilsky National University after Ivan Ohiienko (please find enclosed).”

I also did some networking. In August 2006 I sent the president’s wife, Kateryna Yushchenko, a copy of the request from the Ivan Ohiienko All-Ukrainian Society to President Yushchenko in connection with Ivan Ohiienko’s 125th birth anniversary, specifically the naming of Kamianets-Podilsky State University in his honor and granting it national status in recognition of Ohiienko’s distinguished scholarship. My request was accompanied by a personal letter.

Mrs. Yushchenko promised to help, and the president of Uk­rai­ne’s Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, Vasyl Kremen, also supported our initiative. The only one who refused to give his support was the then Minister of Education, Stanislav Niko­laien­ko, who had also received a copy of the petition to the president on Ohiienko’s 125th anniversary. The letter from the Ministry of Education, dated Nov. 1, 2006 and signed by Deputy Minister M. F. Stepko, notes: “As for naming Ka­mia­nets-Podilsky State Uni­ver­sity after Ivan Ohiienko, this process has been suspended under the Cabinet of Ministers’ Instruction No. 910 of Dec. 16, 2004, ‘On the Suspension of Con­sidering Questions of Na­ming’ until further notice.”

In my 2008 New Year’s and Christmas greetings to Kateryna Yushchenko, I thanked her “for [her] assistance in restoring the good and famous name of Ivan Ohiienko to Ukraine. I know that you also made a contribution to the issuance of the decree ‘On Honoring the Memory of Ivan Ohiienko’ by the President, our dear Viktor Yushchenko.”

All of a sudden, the Ohiienko society received a document from the Presidential Secretariat addressed to the Minister of Education and Science, Ivan Vakar­chuk. On behalf of Mrs. Yushchenko, it requested “fundamental consideration of the petition submitted to Kateryna Yush­chenko by the chairperson of the All-Ukrainian Ivan Ohiienko Society, Ye. Sokhatska, with regard to the proposal to rename Kamianets-Podilsky National University in honor of Ivan Ohiienko.”

All the necessary documents, including a historical reference about the university and Ivan Ohiienko’s record, were sent to the Ministry of Education and Science. The Cabinet of Ministers soon issued an instruction signed by Yulia Tymoshenko, which begins with the phrase “Accept the MES proposal...” It is thus clear that if the education ministry and its head Ivan Vakarchuk had not taken a patriotic stand, there would have been no miracle.

Ivan Ohiienko justly deserves this honor. The renaming in his honor of the university that he founded will encourage students and scholars to undertake new studies of this great Ukrainian’s scholarly legacy. We will continue to urge the Ukrainian government to focus more attention on this matter. It is high time to publish a selection of Ohiienko’s works and explore the possibility of moving his archives to Ukraine from Canada, where they are stored at the consistory of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. We are certain this will be done.

In all our efforts connected with Ohiienko, we have the support of influential organizations, such as the Union of Ukrainian Writers, the International Association for Ukrainian Studies, the Ivan Ohiienko Prize Committee (headed by A. Chebykin), and the well-known Ohiienko scholars O. Zavalniuk, M. Tymoshyk, I. Tiurmenko, Z. Timenyk, Ya. Polishchuk, and others.

Ivan Ohiienko is a symbol of Ukrainian statehood and union, and it is thus appropriate to rename Kamianets-Podilsky National University in his honor. This story should serve as a cautionary note against delays in bringing similar important causes to fruition.

Yevhenia SOKHATSKA is the head of the All-Ukrainian Ivan Ohiienko Society and a professor at the Department of the History of Ukrainian Literature and Comparative Studies at Ivan Ohiienko Kamianets-Podilsky National University.