Society needs a political effect to restore confidence in the state

The Day continues to publish various opinions with regard to problems brought in the limelight by what has here been dubbed the cassette scandal. The more so that another batch of cassette chronicles was received in spite of the New Year and Christmas festivities [in Ukraine Christmas comes after New Year, on January 7], in the form of SBU Major Mykola Melnychenko’s interview with Radio Liberty. After New Year its summary was disseminated by news agencies and the newspaper Silski visti carried the full transcript. The views quoted below represent various aspects of the current political situation. However, certain intermediate conclusions can be arrived at even now. The cassette scandal is finally isolated from the Gongadze case and the issue of the tapes’ authenticity (also, the reasons for the eavesdropping, if any). Society and the political elite are once again losing track of the causes and consequences, giving in to the temptation to make simple decisions. This could trigger off responses like people beginning to feel a revolution is needed, the president seeking support in Moscow, and the freedom of expression almost flourishing in Ukraine with the cassette scandal.

However, simple decisions are not necessarily the correct ones, just as democracy means not only getting elected by a majority of the votes. It also means the ability of the minority to live with that choice. Of course, one may have the idee fixe of turning the tables. In the situation that has developed any umpire, be it the courts or political traditions of living according to the rules, is absent. Moreover, neither the regime nor — and even less so — the opposition wish to have any such umpire. Instead, they are trading no confidence and seem governed by one goal uppermost on everybody’s mind: We’ll beat them! As a result, both sides are making society as a whole suffer. Suppose one of them wins. Then what? Who will believe in the victor’s good intentions? Will this change the relationships between the politicians and the electorate, state, and society? Obviously, there is only one way out: work out rules and use them to resolve the conflict. By doing so, the powers that be and opposition would create a precedent badly needed by this society, a civilized mechanism of settling a conflict. What could be more destructive under the circumstances than a conflict rooted in blind faith? Whoever expects to benefit from the cassette scandal, the main question is how this society can use the current situation for its own good, and this question remains open.