The majoritarian system is back

The members of the political council of the party Our Ukraine were the first to declare their readiness to try the majoritarian system. The other day Valentyn Nalyvaichenko said that “everyone who had accession to power, from Viktor Yushchenko to the last party member have to undergo people’s lustration in the majoritarian districts.” Last Monday, during the Svoboda Slova TV show the member of the parliamentary fraction of the Party of Regions Volodymyr Makeienko declared: “Let’s analyze who changed the majoritarian system to the mixed one and later to the party one. It was done by the big business. And all the other MPs just said nothing. Entering the parliament through the party lists is much easier than being personally responsible before the electors.”

So, a lot of people really set their hopes to the majoritarian system. Another point is that the difference between the majoritarian systems of the early 1990s and the 2010s is obvious even before the elections. Can we expect new people to come through the districts that had been shared between the clans long ago? Can we exclude the administrative reserve in the self-government system which has not been reformed?

Obviously, we can. For this neither more nor less than electors’ will is needed. Are the Ukrainians ready to vote not for the buckwheat but for the political programs? This is what we discussed with the head of the political council of Our Ukraine Valentyn NALYVAICHENKO.

Your declaration that the majoritarian system has to become a certain lustration for the politicians, in particular, the former president Viktor Yushchenko has to be elected to the parliament through a majoritarian district has drawn a wide response. Are many politicians ready for this?

“Those who have the courage to call themselves politicians, especially those who have already had accession to power have to run for the parliament through the majoritarian districts, report and thus undergo the ‘people’s lustration.’ This is my personal political position. Both the government and the opposition have to apply the mechanisms they speculate about so much to themselves: answerability of the power comprising the former one to the people.

“On Monday I took part at the meeting of the Dictatorship Resistance Committee. We made a very important political decision about the real consolidation and joint political actions during the election campaign. As for our political force, we decided that we will go to the majoritarian districts and undergo the lustration.”

The Ukrainian political tradition considered, the consolidation of the opposition is a very high standard.

“One should not consider only one political force and one political leader to be right. Cult of the leader is the worst disease of the Ukrainian opposition and not only. I support expending the format of the Dictatorship Resistance Committee and inviting unparliamentary forces and public movements to it. In my opinion, the movement of the Afghan war veterans and Chornobyl disaster fighters has more rights in the Dictatorship Resistance Committee than some of the politicians represented there.”

Voting for the law “On the parliamentary elections” proved once again that not all the oppositionists are ready to consolidate in the parliament.

“It was a sell out. We have been insisting on excluding the ‘turncoats’ from the fractions. The current situation in the opposition is due to the deputy’s disloyalty to their mandates and election programs. Now we have to work out a joint action plan and define the specific mechanisms for the protection of the free expression of popular will. Later we will endorse the candidates in the districts.”

Have you personally thought in which district you would like to run?

“It is important not to hide in a district but go to the people. Last week I was in Kharkiv, met the doctors, public activists, journalists, in particular, the channel ATN that we are protecting from the repressions of the local authorities. We have to meet people all over Ukraine. And then, I think, the local communities will say what they think. If you ask about the possibilities to arrange for distributing the districts among the members of the opposition ‘politburo’ I will tell you that it would discredit to the real consolidated opposition. It would be unfair towards the people. It is the concern of the local communities. The local dictatorship resistance committees exist in every region. They have to suggest the candidates that have to be endorsed in Kyiv and not vice versa.”

The majoritarian system is a huge responsibility for the people as well. There is a temptation to vote, as they say, “for the buckwheat.” Are the Ukrainians ready for this test?

“They will be if the political forces, comprising the unparliamentary ones, can suggest a real action plan as an alternative to what is happening now. Then there will not be any buckwheat but a clear understanding that the people who represent the opposition have the idea how to change the situation for better and do not compete who is a better oppositionist.”

Do you think the Ukrainians are ready to attentively read the programs?

“The Ukrainians are ready to fight for their social rights. They have to be protected and supported in this initiative. The Ukrainians have been ready to protect their voting rights; they want the elections to be fair. The opposition has to clearly present its action plan: from the election commissions to the observers, from counting of votes to the responsibility for the election programs fulfillment. The Ukrainians are ready to fight the corruption. And we, as responsible politicians, have to suggest how to do it.”

The party UDAR of Vitali Klitschko declared that the recent developments in Donetsk are a reason to fire Azarov’s Cabinet.

“I also said it. I support Vitali and other honest people in Ukraine. The heads of the law-enforcement agencies in Donetsk have to be fired through declarations and actions. It is necessary to find out who ordered to use force against the protesters which resulted in one person’s death. The guilty has to be put into a pre-trial prison and answer for his anti-humane order.”

By the way, we got the information from a source in the government that the Party of Regions does not consider the resignation of the cabinet and all the information of this kind is an attempt of the interested parties to set Kliuiev and Azarov loggerheads.

“Neither Azarov, nor Kliuiev or Tihipko pursue the policy in the Ukrainians’ interests. That is why there is no sense in trading bad for worse. The government’s actions are antinational. That is why we have to change the whole government without any exceptions. We should immediately start complete payments to the Pension Fund through cutting the expenses of the whole ministries and redirecting this money to the pension funds. Then we should severely fight the corruption and strip of power those who have business. The big businessmen with their factories and plants should work in the economic sector and pay taxes instead of governing the state. Since there will not be any socially protected person in the state with their government. It seems to me that it is clear to everybody that the big business cannot be in public positions and moreover, be socially responsible to the people.”

There is recent information that very expensive laptop computers of 11,300 hryvnias each have been bought for the MPs. Do the deputies of the fraction NU-NS use them?

“All our deputies supported Iryna Heraschenko’s initiative and refused those expensive laptops. We think that the money for this computers should be directed to the Donetsk pension fund. Lytvyn, the Party of Regions and the Communists should not spend so much for the fences around their sanatoriums, computers, and posh cars. The Verkhovna Rada has to leave one car and direct the money for the rest of them to another pension fund in Luhansk. Believe me that the garage of the Verkhovna Rada is enough to fund it during the whole year.”