Will new parliament live up to Maidan expectations?

Viktor NEBOZHENKO, political scientist; director, sociological service Ukrainian Barometer:

“The new Rada must grow up minute by minute – it must self-organize and elect its leadership as soon as possible. Their first task is not very essential: not to launch a month-long speaker’s race, as they did about the coalition agreement. Essentially, the Rada must focus on military reform, local government reform, and the budget.

“All that is now going on about the future portfolios is in the corridors of power. Moreover, publicity turned out to be painful. The Popular Front has said bluntly that Arsenii Yatseniuk must remain the prime minister, which has complicated the task for all the others who suggest bargaining. In this situation, the unwillingness of other factions to go public is very embarrassing. What was the Maidan for if such things as bargaining and score-settling are going on?

“The coalition agreement has a major drawback. The more signers there are, the less responsibility is for each faction. On the whole, this agreement is a set of good wishes and a tranquilizer, which is important for Ukraine, is mostly of a public nature for the West, and is an irritant for Putin. But it is hard to say that things will go as planned, for there are so many tasks there that it makes the behavior of our politicians unpredictable.

“The newly-elected Rada will be working in the next six months in the same vein as the Cabinet. Then the necessity to carry out reforms more actively may trigger the first crisis. This will bring about quite a difficult situation because 120 people who support the Kremlin and are disguised as the Opposition Bloc and as first-past-the-post MPs scattered among diverse factions will be sabotaging the course of reforms. For Putin, a Rada that is dealing with reforms is worse than a defeat in Donetsk. Therefore, any changes in the country will be strongly resisted.

“Laws are sure to be lobbied, when factions will be dividing money between themselves. And the question of a real opposition will arise by the end of the first session. We will only have a coalition just now and there will be no opposition as such, which means inadequate performance of parliament. The opposition is those who will be pressing the government for resolute reformatory changes. The Opposition Bloc cannot be called opposition. According to the latest parliamentary vogue, a number of Rada committees – on law and order, the media, and the budget   – are to be given to opposition as a matter of principle. But we cannot hand them over to the Party of Regions in the guise of the Opposition Bloc. It would have been the same as assigning the role of the opposition to the SS party in 1947 Bundestag. They continue to work in the same loutish style as they did when they were in power. The people who used to rape the country cannot possible turn into its priests.

“It is quite clear now that Yatseniuk will stay on as premier. Besides, the Presidential Administration has failed to ‘knock out’ Avakov as minister of the interior. The ones whom the Administration is lobbying as the speaker will not go through – in all probability, voting for Matviienko or Hroisman will produce no results. Voting is a terrible thing in the Ukrainian realities, which may bring about unexpected candidates and situations during the speaker’s race. The likeliest option is Turchynov whom both the Popular Front and Samopomich may support.

“The current situation for the Rada and the future Cabinet is the same as after the Maidan – something must be done. And whoever will get more power will also create the worst impression if no reforms have been carried out.

“When we speak about a ‘caretaker government,’ this does not mean that non-party railroad men, firefighters, or surgeons will come to power. This means a government to which international financial institutions may entrust their money and which follows a certain plan linked to the geopolitical factor.”

Interviewed by Ivan KAPSAMUN, The Day