Posted on February 22, 2010 - by Venik

Timoshenko’s Battleplan

Not a week ago Ukraine’s Prime Minister appeared determined to argue her case in court. She outlined a comprehensive legal strategy that seemed certain to tie down her archnemesis in court for months, bankrupt the government, and push the country closer to anarchy. But yesterday Timoshenko withdrew her complaint from the Supreme Administrative Court and announced that she had no further plans to engage Yanukovich in legal battles. The Court agreed to drop the case and lifted the temporary injunction against the Central Election Committee. Thus, Yanukovich seems to be on-schedule for his February 25 inauguration.

Timoshenko motivated her decision by claiming the courts were corrupt and the entire world was against her. In reality, however, Julia just had the weekend to cool down a bit and realize that her legal case was almost non-existent. A loss in the Supreme Administrative Court seemed virtually unavoidable. Even more likely would have been the subsequent defeat in the Supreme Court. A legal loss would have decimated Timoshenko’s ability to effectively oppose Yanukovich. Her decision to drop the legal vector in her crusade against the dark forces of the Kremlin was the only correct choice. For now at least.

Timoshenko is still very popular in Ukraine. The battle will shift to the Verkhovna Rada (the parliament). Much will depend on the ability of Yanukovich and his supporters to form a new coalition capable of defeating Timoshenko’s political bloc. To undermine Timoshenko’s position, Ukraine’s president-elect was quick to announce his options for the country’s Prime Minister. They are his former opponents in the presidential race: Sergey Tygipko and Arseniy Yatsenyuk. Both are leaders of sizable political parties represented in the Rada and both got more votes in the election than Ukraine’s current president, Victor Yushchenko.

These choices are intended to help the Party of the Regions form a new ruling coalition. There are 450 seats in the Rada. The Party of the Regions has 173 seats, Timoshenko’s Bloc (consisting of three political parties) – 153, the OUPS coalition (consisting of ten political parties) has 71 seats, the Communists hold 27 seats, the Litvin coalition has 20 seats and the remaining six members of the Parliament do not belong to any political blocs. To achieve the magic 226-seat ruling majority the Party of the Regions will need nothing short of a miracle. But Kiev is a place where miracles occur at least twice every week.

A common sight: a fistfight in the Rada. The speaker of the parliament is about to lose his argument and a couple of his teeth to boot.

Should the miracle business fall through, Ukraine is scheduled to hold regional elections on May 30. These can be economically combined with early parliamentary elections. Holding new Rada elections, however, would be the last resort for both Yanukovich and Timoshenko, as neither can predict the outcome with any degree of confidence. In the 2007 parliamentary elections the Party of the Regions lost about ten seats, while Timoshenko’s bloc gained a few. Publicly,  Timoshenko seems optimistic about her coalition’s chances in early elections.

Privately, she has to be very concerned. Much has changed in Ukraine’s political landscape over the past three years. The leaders of the “Orange Revolution” have completely discredited themselves in the public eye. It is entirely possible that Ukrainians may use early parliamentary election to express their frustration and give more votes to the “Regionals”. It is equally possible that fabled Ukrainian stubbornness will come into play and the “Oranges” will stick to their guns, ending up with a pointless reshuffle of political forces in the parliament.

Over the past two decades Ukrainians have built themselves a completely dysfunctional political system – a fact clearly reflected in the country’s imploding economy. What did Ukrainian electorate learn from past political mistakes and present financial ruin? Not a damn thing, I am afraid. If Ukraine holds early parliamentary elections, the end result will be the same useless hodgepodge of fleeting political alliances.

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