On June 20 nose and equipment were broken in the Crimean Parliament
Expert lawyers will have to sweat trying to figure out the legitimacy of the Crimean Supreme Council’s June 20 decision and whether its resolutions can be regarded as legally valid. Our task is merely to give a fair account of what actually transpired in the Crimean parliamentary auditorium, including a less than parliamentary brawl leaving a nose broken and equipment vandalized.
Of 35 points on the agenda, only two or three made the legislative audience interested, which was nothing out of the ordinary, of course. Those points were actually what had attracted the people’s elects to attend in the first place, among them People’s Deputies Lev Mirimsky, Valery Horbatov, Anatoly Drobotov, and Valery Kucherenko. They were primarily interested in hearing the Autonomous Republic’s Finance Ministry’s 2001 budget and the cabinet’s progress report. Several other points on the agenda were to be dealt with as flowing from these: changes in the law of the Crimea On the Council of Ministers of the Crimea (the bill had been passed by the previous Crimean parliament), changes in the structure of Crimean property, privatization of property complexes, cancellation of some of the Crimean cabinet’s previous resolutions, and so on.
The first votes showed that Leonid Hrach had an asset of 56-58, as predicted. Naturally, the edge was provided by Labor Ukraine, albeit still to be officially registered. Moreover, the computer warned from the outset that the cards used exceeded the actual number of lawmakers. People were detailed to search the audience for the “doubles,” found none, for those punching the wrong buttons had by then taken seats other than those detected by the computer. As a result, further computer signals about double voting were simply ignored. When it came time to put the fourth item, the Crimean cabinet’s progress report, on the agenda, Serhiy Kunitsyn informed the Solons that the government held the issue invalid, considering negative findings supplied by the Ministry of Justice; that the government had decided to recall the report submitted at the start of the year, in view of the new evidence; that he was thus under orders not to present the report if and when approved [for presentation]. Naturally, no one paid attention, and Leonid Hrach put the issue to the vote, receiving the required 59 ayes, whereupon dissenting lawmakers left their seats and besieged the rostrum, the speaker carrying on with the vote, now and then shouting “Approved!” in the overall din.
When it came time for the Ministry of Finance to report, Liudmyla Denysova refused to take the floor, so the speaker recognized the co-reporter, Mykola Horbatov, chairman of the accounting chamber. He did not speak from the rostrum but used another microphone somewhere in the auditorium. He started reading the text and some of the lawmakers began to applaud to muffle his voice. Many tried to approach him, but others would not let them. A brawl started by the podium. Someone tore Horbatov’s microphone from its socket. Another microphone was supplied, but fist fights were now in progress in diffarent places in the parliamentary audience. It was then the Anatoly Sitkov stepped in (not a legislator but a Communist, they say, currently manager of the Feodosiya Tobacco Plant, secretary of the town committee, and a member of the Communist Party of Ukraine). He met Deputy Oleksandr Riabkov in the lobby, they started to fight and Riabkov received a hard blow in the face, later being hospitalized. Still later, Comrade Sitkov told journalists that it was his way to call the people’s deputy to order.
Mykola Horbatov’s co-report was not deliberated in parliament. Although he proposed to qualify his presentation as “unsatisfactory, the documents to be placed on record pending the next cabinet report hearing,” Leonid Hrach proposed to reject the budget bill (“reject” was the term he actually used — Author) and have the issue adjourned to the next session. The computer vote turnout read 55 ayes.
Finally, it was the cabinet’s turn to report. Leonid Hrach proposed to forward a message to the president of Ukraine, considering that Serhiy Kunitsyn had refused to report. He read the text, stating all parliamentary grievances against the Crimean government, climaxing in the request that the cabinet’s retirement be granted: “While hereby reaffirming the Resolution of the Supreme Council of the Autonomous Republic of the Crimea, February 1, 2000, and May 24, 2000, proclaiming the performance of the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of the Crimea as unsatisfactory and demanding its replacement, we address this message to you, Esteemed Leonid Danylovych, as President of Ukraine, requesting your consent to the dismissal of Mr. Kunitsyn from his post as Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of the Crimea.” When the issue was put to the vote the computer once again signaled a double vote, and the indicator board went blank. The man in charge of the computer announced a system error, another din ensued with Leonid Hrach shouting “Resolution passed with 55 ayes.” After that the lawmakers jumped from their seats, many heading for the lobby to deal with Sitkov. There is a videotape showing General Mykola Aheyev, deputy chief of the Crimean police, arguing with Deputy Lev Mirimsky, showing squabbles and fisticuffs among other people’s deputies.
Meanwhile the speaker held the session “in order,” announcing points on the agenda by order of priority. Some legislators spoke from their seats “apropos the matter, without deliberation,” and Leonid Hrach put every issue to the vote and received 55-58 ayes on the computer. Practically, every issue was dealt with in such a manner and the session was closed 11:20 a.m.
And next?
In an interview, Leonid Hrach stated he was not a “political scientist and cannot read tea leaves,” meaning President Kuchma’s response to the Crimean parliament’s message. When asked about breaches of parliamentary rules, he said there were none, “on the contrary, there were breaches committed by Serhiy Kunitsyn. He refused to abide by the constitution and did not deliver the required report, thus creating a precedent.” When asked about the shoving, Leonid Hrach said, “Our parliament is, unfortunately, no exception to other parliaments the world over.”
After the parliamentary session, Serhiy Kunitsyn told the media it was “a political farce and the session was held contrary to the rules... People got scared, but I am determined to continue working. Since the resolution was passed contrary to established procedures, I believe the president will not respond to such illegitimate decisions. We have prepared a statement for a court of law and the court will denounce all such decisions as illegal. We have to harvest grain and keep our resorts running during the season.”
“What made you lose the majority?”
“We haven’t lost it. The thing is that deputies Lev Mirimsky and Valery Horbatov were actively at play, building the so-called Trudova Ukrayina (Labor Ukraine) faction. These deputies have always moved between and around Hrach and Kunitsyn. We do not have a politically stable majority, nor does Hrach. I would not be surprised to hear that the deputies will join us tomorrow, saying let’s get rid of Hrach because their candidate premier will not pass anyway. We must have a stable majority for the 2002 elections. I read today’s issue of the Krymsky chas [Crimean Times] and learned of lot of interesting things. We are preparing a book on Lev Mirimsky. His biography is far superior to mine. The book will be a bestseller, with shoot-outs, car races, and all that. Before long we’ll learn a lot more about [all those public] property privatization ventures... My life story is a poor match for theirs, so I feel calm about the entire situation.”
“Who are those striving to implement the resolution?”
“First the Communists, also certain political groups led by Lev Mirimsky and Horbatov, people from Labor Ukraine — not all of them, because I know that they still cannot agree on any united stand. Well, some officials, but not the president. What they passed today is not a resolution, but a message. Leonid Hrach is scared and I don’t doubt for a moment that what we have are elements of a criminal revolution; they want me out of the way not because I am no good professionally, but because of my political views and the attitude toward property. I was resolutely opposed to the privatization of chemical enterprises, those of the fuel sector, and a number of resort projects. That’s the crux of the matter.”
The situation remains ambiguous, yet several inferences seem in order. First, it is clear that the Crimean parliament’s vote was falsified and still is. This is dangerous, discrediting practically every resolution passed to date, meaning that experts will have to deal with the problem, the more so that falsification has long been discussed.
Second, the Ukrainian president’s noninterference in the Crimean parliament’s warring sections is regarded as Mr. Kuchma’s bad mistake on the peninsula, the more so that every time grievances are addressed to Bankova Street. The result is that the situation in this region, explosive as it is, often gets out of the president’s control, with individual deputies never missing an opportunity to capitalize on it, doing so to reach their own property and political clan goals.
According to The Day’s information, Chairman of the Crimean Tatar Majlis Mustafa Dzhemiliov, who is now receiving treatment for a serious disease in Turkey, gave a commission to the Majlis to prepare, if necessary, protest actions by the Crimean Tatars in connection with the decision of the Crimean parliament on ousting the government. “We have long awaited an opportunity to come out openly against the Communist outrage in the Crimea, and now the time has come,” he said.
The People’s Democratic Party (NDP) press service came out with a statement saying, “The appeal by the Supreme Council of the Autonomous Republic of the Crimea to the President of Ukraine on June 20, 2001 has no legal basic, since it is based on the decisions of the parliament of the Crimea from February 1, 2000, and May 24, 2000, which were legally appealed and acknowledged by the court as incompatible with the current legislation of Ukraine and the rules of the Crimean parliament.”
Simultaneously, leader of the Trudova Ukrayina (Labor Ukraine) Party Serhiy Tihipko said in his speech on Ukrainian television that Trudova Ukrayina has made no decision regarding the situation in the Crimea, and the events in the Crimean parliament reflect only the personal stand of some members of the party.
Incidentally, according to one version, at least five deputies of the Crimean parliament were assaulted, brought to the session, and voted to bring down the government against their will.
