Is opposition mature enough for National Project?

While some are chatting endlessly, others are doing something – silently and without too much fuss. Some media alleged the other day that the Party of Regions and the People’s Party had agreed to merge, as a result of which Volodymyr Lytvyn would assume the office of party deputy leader. Although Lytvyn’s spokesperson Olha Chorna immediately denied this information, there is no fire without smoke, so to speak.

Incidentally, it became known on September 27 that Strong Ukraine would officially “surrender” to the Party of Regions in about a month’s time – on October 22 at a congress of the former.

As the Regionnaires have swallowed Tihipko, so they will do, sooner or later, Lytvyn and his People’s party, experts believe. The Party of Regions is forming a megaparty similar to United Russia. It is beyond any doubt that they will do so.

Is the opposition going to follow the government’s example? Will this be the last warning for Tymoshenko, Yatseniuk, Lutsenko, Nalyvaichenko, Kyrylenko, Hrytsenko, Katerynchuk, Tarasiuk, and others to unite and form a fist of their own? Will the democrats manage to five up their ambitions and form an opposition party of their own? It looks rather unlikely.

It is Viacheslav Kyrylenko, the For Ukraine party leader, who seems to be the most determined advocate of the opposition’s single list in the next elections. In his view, there should be a strong platform “as a counterbalance to the Party of Regions list which will, quite predictably, include Tihipko, Lytvyn, the United Center, and all those required. It is clear that if there are dozen of oppositions to such a powerful list, the opposition’s destiny will be a foregone conclusion.”

Addressing the Dictatorship Resistance Committee, Kyrylenko even proposed an agreement on the opposition’s joint actions. This means a single election list and reaching agreements on single-winner constituency candidates. In case of a victory in the parliamentary elections, the BYuT-Fatherland and NU-NS will have to undertake to form a “democratic majority” in the Verkhovna Rada.

“There really is a draft of this document,” a BYuT MP told The Day. “All this process is being debated now. There are both proponents and opponents. For example, Kyrylenko supports it but Yatseniuk does not. What will this lead to? We shall see. For the time being, everybody has been assigned a task. I still think they will be as pragmatic as they can.”

Indeed, Yatseniuk has said more than once on TV that when the opposition marches on in two columns (Fatherland and Front of Changes), it will win more votes. And those who advocated merging should choose between Fatherland and Front of Changes. Let them join the party that is closer to them. “Join us, gentlemen,” as a hero of Mark Zakharov’s legendary film says.

“Only the projects that work for one leader will be successful in Ukraine. But there are several of them, for rating are tumbling down, comrades are squabbling, and people are turning away,” political scientist Vadym Karasiov says.

We have also asked other political scientists if a single opposition list can be formed.

Volodymyr LUPATSII, political scientist; director, Sophia Social Survey Center:

“The opposition is trying to rally today under the pressure of the ruling circles. There is so far no positive and productive project around which the opposition could unite. The point is this kind of project calls for a vision of this country’s further development, when a certain political force is trying to mobilize its potential to realize this vision. In this case these political forces could rally potentials together. But when the political forces’ sole concern is the outcome of the current election race, they will usually vie with one another, rather than unite, on the same political field.

“The unifying efforts we see now may be called ‘formation of certain party trade unions.’ The opposition parties, which have failed to strike roots and form a well-ramified system of partnership in the regions, turn out to be very vulnerable when they suddenly remain outside the ruling circles. Today, most of the decisions are being made by executive bodies, while parliament performs the function of embellishing or slightly modifying the initiatives that come from the inside of the executive branch. The parliamentary ground is in the phase of political anemia: it has no subject. For this reason, most of the political forces lack parliamentary background to be able to wield influence outside parliament. So the political forces that represent the opposition turned out to be unprepared to work in the new conditions.”

Kostiantyn MATVIIENKO, expert, Gardarica Strategic Consulting Corporation:

“The opposition has the problem of extremely low public trust. The current opposition has already been in power, so it is now reaping – in the shape of court trials – the fruits of its efforts (or effortlessness) in the field of judicial and law enforcement reform. Society is also feeling the consequences of this opposition’s record. As a result, the oppositionist forces have today to rally on the remnants of an electoral field: therefore, the smaller the electorate, the more fierce rivalry for it. There is no trust in these political forces, and when there is no trust, zero plus zero will produce nothing but zero. So they have no groundwork to rally upon.

“Besides, it is an open secret that the opposition is currying favor with the ruling camp. The example of this may be the appointment of some former BYuT and NU-NS members as top governmental officials. This is being done on a selective basis. In other cases, the Party of Regions fully swallows parties, such as Strong Ukraine, with the People’s Party next on the line. Therefore, while the government has ample grounds – joint consumption of the country’s resources, – to be united, the opposition does not have this motive. Do you remember the time when various political forces broke away from the Popular Movement? It is now the case with NU-NS. When Yushchenko enjoyed a high public rating, everybody tried to rally around his boat, but when the rating dropped, they all ran away. So it would be wrong to say that the opposition will unite and produce an effective political tool.”