European Charter against European values
The Verkhovna Rada is going to discuss the notorious bill “On Principles of the Official Language Policy” drawn up by the Party of Regions members Vadym Kolesnichenko and Serhii Kivalov. This draft law provides for the use of a national minority language in a certain region, where more than 10 percent of the population considers it native. According to MP Borys TARASIUK (www.pravda.com.ua), this will mean in practice the regional status of the Russian language in 13 oblasts and, as a “pleasant bonus,” a similar status of Hungarian in Transcarpathia and Romanian in Bukovyna. “The Crimean Autonomous Republic ‘was the luckiest’: in addition to Russian, the Crimeans will be ‘presented with’ the Crimean Tatar language which the Tatars are in fact free to use in the local government, education, and cultural life,” he says. “If this bill is voted into law, we can forget about the Ukrainian language in cities,” www.newsru.ua quotes MP Oles DONII as saying, “for, under the guise of liberalism, humanism, and democracy, they are packaging again the idea that Ukrainian will not be used in universities, on television, in advertising, or in the places where at least 10 percent consider Russian as their mother tongue.”
“Pushing through this initiative, Vadym Kolesnichenko is flaunting, above all, the support of the Venice Commission and higher educational institutions, particularly Kyiv Taras Shevchenko National University, National Mykhailo Drahomanov Teacher-Training University, National Linguistic University, Taurida National Volodymyr Vernadsky University, Ternopil National Teacher-Training University (I cover my head with ashes, as I am its alumna), and Odesa National Illia Mechnikov University. Firstly, the Venice Commission, a Council of Europe advisory board on constitutional law, which makes conclusions on whether legislative acts meet European standards and values, clearly failed to look into our situation. Secondly, this is by no means the first time that universities are siding with somebody on the eve of the presidential or parliamentary elections, not to mention the drawing of the “language card.” For it is the question of societal disunity, separatist sentiments, and, in the last analysis, the ousting of not only the Ukrainian language, but also Ukrainian culture in general from eastern and southern Ukraine.
Ivan DZIUBA, public activist, expert in literature, author of the famed work Internationalism or Russification?:
“The bill ‘On Principles of the Official Language Policy’ is super false. Its authors hypocritically pretend to care about the languages of national minorities; however, in fact they want Russification, pernicious for Ukraine. The Ukrainian parliament should watch how the existing constitutional law on languages in Ukraine is observed: it defines Ukrainian as the national language and guarantees the development of other languages. The law is perfect and fair, however, a number of guarantees for Ukrainian as the national language remain fictitious. The Ukrainian authorities have developed the deficit of Ukrainian. In these conditions Ukraine’s bitter enemies, acting in the interests of the Russian imperialism hurry up to take the floor.”
