Soccer key to a united Europe
Can the Euro-2012 in Ukraine be considered simply as a sports event? This is a rhetorical question, much as we would like to see our national team win. However, the realities are such that Euro-2012 will far exceed the sports framework. Consider the manner in which Ukraine is preparing for this event. Most likely it will be compared to a lost opportunity or a further postponement of Ukraine’s admission to the European Community. The soccer championship requires not just a concentration of human and financial resources but also an awareness of the price it will have to pay if Euro-2012 is held on the same level as Eurovision two and a half years ago.
Last Monday Kyiv hosted a conference dedicated to Euro-2012, which discussed the technical and practical problems that are emerging during the preparations for the soccer finals. Characteristically, the Ukrainian side did not proceed from the existing problems that can still call into question the venue of the championships, even though a formal decision about this was passed a long time ago. “Without a doubt, the objective and tasks of this tournament can be achieved to a certain degree only if there is a complex approach to resolving basic issues of international legal relations function in the world of sports. This sphere of regulation is the sole prerogative of this country’s legislative body,” declared Hryhorii Surkis, president of the Ukrainian Soccer Federation, addressing the conference.
Federation experts have prepared proposals for changes and amendments to current legislation. Surkis says they have to be professionally and legally assessed and processed. When will the Verkhovna Rada deliberate them? One shouldn’t make any shortcuts in view of the time left before the event, because the key issues include intellectual property, unfair competition, investments, and partnerships involving the state and individual business entities, as well as labor laws. These are the most complicated issues that still have not been resolved. Is it enough to pass legislation? Will these laws work?
Surkis noted that there is a situation in Ukraine that is “unprecedented in world legal practice,” one in which legally adopted documents aimed at facilitating proper arrangements for Euro-2012 are being chronically ignored. “The key issues that our creative duo (the conference organized by the Verkhovna Rada’s Institute of Legislation and the Soccer Federation) proposes as the leitmotif of this conference are a comparison of Ukrainian and European rights in the sphere of sports, and the development and substantiation of concrete proposals aimed at bringing them together.”
Surkis stressed that the European community is very interested in resolving the legal fundamentals of its cooperation with Ukraine: “The West wants transparent, lawful, and predictable relations with all interested business entities in the country that will be hosting Euro-2012.”
The president of Ukrainian Soccer Federation is convinced that “if we don’t rid ourselves of our recurrent legal nihilism, particularly among our bureaucrats, we will never overcome corruption, bribery, and humbuggery, which are nullifying all the efforts of the Ukrainian government to prepare adequately for hosting Euro- 2012.” He also believes that “the implementation of this nationwide project, which the majority of our population regards as the final round of the European championship, still lacks 100-percent guarantees for obtaining results.” Surkis also pointed out that not only have a number of target-oriented government resolutions and decisions passed by the Euro-2012 coordinating and organizing committees not been implemented, those that were adopted by the Verkhovna Rada and even edicts signed by the president of Ukraine on Aug. 31 and Oct. 24, 2007, have not been set into motion: “Why are the top levers of power not working to protect our national interests? Can our society protect this national interest against the criminal inactivity of high-ranking bureaucrats?” Surkis asked at the conference. “Effective preparations and the holding of the European soccer championship finals here will be a serious test that will show our ability to be a full-fledged partner in international humanitarian projects; a bona fide executor of commitments with regard to the international and European soccer community.”
I would add here that soccer is not the sole issue, and unlike many bureaucrats who issue loud public statements about European membership, Surkis is well aware of this. “As the president of the hosting association, I am proud of the fact that our ‘soccer diplomacy’ has become one of those golden keys that can open the doors to bright European prospects for my country.”
In the big picture little else is required, except learning the fundamental truth that every European knows: laws must be carried out.
