The Ukrainian President has on several occasions come out with statements making it clear that he will not disband Parliament just because it cannot elect the Speaker. Later, however, another twist was added: in a situation like this, in any civilized country Parliament would be dissolved.
Usually, such statements make headline and politicians from both camps quote the President under titles like "President is Resolved" or "President Wants to Do Away with Lawfully Elected Parliament."
Either way this plays into the President's hands and to an outside observer the situation looks as follows: the President could order Parliament dissolved, but does not do so due to various reasons. The implication is that the Chief Executive is extremely patient, but there is an end to every man's patience, so... For some reason no one seems to remember that under the Constitution the President has no right to dissolve Parliament, so discussing the possibility is pointless. In this sense the President should be criticized for allowing such discussions and for making statements implying that he can – in theory – violate the Constitution so blatantly.
Of course, I may be countered at this point that the President could disregard the Constitution if he wanted to. Skipping the likely consequences, I would reply to this that the President does not look the type to venture such a drastic move. Evidence is found in his appearance in the nightly TV news on June 30 when he repeated the above thesis in the presence of silent army generals. I do not know whether the generals were included into the scene on purpose, but if the program director did it to add weight to the President's words, the effect achieved was quite the opposite. Anyway, the scene "President Kuchma with Generals" looked simply ridiculous.
Incidentally, the President is wrong saying that in a situation like the present one Parliament would be dissolved in any civilized country. This rule applies only when Parliament is authorized to form the Cabinet. The logic is simple: Parliament without a majority means that there will be no Cabinet (which is inadmissible, of course), so this Parliament must be disbanded and new elections slated. Needless to say, this situation has nothing to do with what is going on in Ukraine.






