many Western commentators find fault with the YuGov for the wrong reasons

I just sent off a letter response to the New York Times about the article "Ukraine's Revolution is Mired Over Markets" by International Herald Tribune writer Judy Dempsey. In the hopes that they might run it, I won't reprint the article itself; however, I would like to talk about some of the common errors Dempsey brings up.

The underlying theory seems to be that the YuGov is hopelessly conflicted, with half the government, led by Tymoshenko, pulling in a Socialist direction and half, led by Yushchenko, in a capitalist free-market direction. With the government divided against itself, nothing gets done and the country stagnates.

Corrupt Decisionmaking is Worse than Bad Decisionmaking

In late June, Taras Kuzio wrote the one best refutation of the YuGov-is-floundering idea that I've seen in English. Essentially, he argued that western attention has not been focused on the make-or-break issue for the YuGov:

...The Orange Revolution and Yushchenko's election took place when a sizeable proportion of Ukrainian voters began to believe that Yushchenko was different from other politicians. As in many post-communist states, after a decade of "transition" Ukrainian voters believed that all politicians were corrupt and only wanted public office for personal gain.

The fate of the Orange Revolution and Yushchenko himself hinges upon whether or not Ukrainians continue to believe the new president is different, rather than lumping him with former presidents Leonid Kravchuk and Kuchma. So far, despite a number of crucial mistakes made by the Yushchenko administration, ratings for Yushchenko and Tymoshenko remain high.

Coincidentally, fighting corruption is one of the big things the government has done right. Some of the examples are in this New Europe article. My favorite move is his disbanding of all traffic police in mid-July, 23,000 officers in all. If you asked an average Ukrainian about how they've experienced corruption personally, the most common examples would probably be getting pulled over by the Gaishniki (from the Russian acronym for the traffic police, GAI).

Of course there will eventually be some officers out on the street pulling people over, so the government's going to need to make sure the new GAIs are better than the old GAIs, but I think it was a great symbolic first step. In general, the YuGov's effectiveness at fulfilling this campaign promise bodes well for its chances in the March parliamentary election.

Moroz is a Socialist, Tymoshenko is a pro-Yushchenko Populist

Not only is economics not the biggest problem for the government, it's also not causing the major fissures commentators talk about. Supposedly there is an irreconcilable conflict of vision between Yushchenko and Tymoshenko. Oh the romance of it! Two shining lights of the Orange Revolution, with victory already in their hands, tearing the government and the nation apart around themselves. The house of Ukraine divided. The two lead actors in a relationship filled with tension... and passion. Now all we need is timely return of an estranged brother and somone in the Cabinet to be struck by total amnesia and you'll be able to show the story on daytime TV.

In developing the idea of a schism in government, Tymoshenko is cast as a Socialist, because without her the schism just cracks off a sharp corner on the left. Every time this happens, I remember a speech to the press she gave way back in the middle of the Orange Revolution. At it, a reporter asked her what opinion she had about constitutional reform that would take power away from Yushchenko. The Socialists demanded these changes before they would help Yushchenko reform the electoral process so that the re-run of the election might take place in a fair environment. They did this because none of them would ever get enough votes to be elected president and the Communist party is a basket-case; therefore, the president was sure to be more of a free-market capitalist than they wanted. If Tymoshenko had even the slightest leftist leanings, you would expect her to be somewhat sympathetic to the Socialists. Instead she looked at the move as a fat present to Kuchma and everyone else opposed to reform:

"It would be as if, when Hitler lost the campaign, Churchill and Stalin came up to him and said, 'Well, you can stay in power, but just change some of your Nazi regime a bit.'" She went on to say that the bill allowed the Prosecutor General to maintain a disproportionate amount of power, thus retaining the "the worst part of 1937" (an allusion to the great powers of the Stalinist government), and that the reduced powers Yushchenko will have after September 1st will make it much more difficult for him to keep his campaign promises.

Later on in the speech she defended Yushchenko's actions during the economic crisis being caused by the uncertain political climate:

"I cannot think of anyone who could better handle the economic crisis than Yushchenko; it is his professional expertise. I think Yushchenko will be able to fix the economic, and indeed, financial and even gas problems in the country... faster than anyone else."

If Tymoshenko were anything like an ideological Socialist, she would have phrased things differently. She also wouldn't have vociferously called for the current Socialists in Yushchenko's Cabinet to be replaced.

One last time: Tymoshenko is a Populist. She speaks out on things that agitate Ukrainians in ways that appeal to them. That's how she survived years of being reviled in pro-Kuchma media. She said "The Kuchma government is full of crooks!" This was exactly what everyone wanted to say, and being brave enough to do so won her enough support to escape imprisonment.

Now that she's in power, the mistakes she makes continue to be ones that appeal to average voters. She said the government would reprivatize thousands, not just dozens, of "stolen" state businesses. Foreign analysts have said this frightened off investors worried that their assets might be expropriated by the government (never mind that the foreign investors for whom this is significant are obviously not the target of her rhetoric), but I find it hard to look at the speech as anything but populist rhetoric that got out-of-hand. Ukrainians, by huge majorities, think the businesses were wrongly privatized. They are all for reprivatization if they think it will be fair this time, and I have been amazed before at the extent to which western correspondents ignore this public sentiment.

Tymoshenko's also been called a socialist for advocating price controls on things like bread, milk, sugar, but this also looks like playing to the crowd to me. The only way these could be more clear bread-and-butter issues would be if you churned the milk issue a little.

The last clue that Tymoshenko is not ideologically wed to Socialism is her reaction to being overruled by Yushchenko. When he overrules her, as he did regarding reprivatization and oil, she expresses some irritation and that's it. Yushchenko get's his way and that's the last of the issue. Just like the woman said, she defers to Yushchenko on economic matters.

Tymoshenko isn't the only miscast character, though.

Nobody Talks to Nemtsov

How many times have I got to read Nemtsov's comment: "Tymoshenko is very left-wing, hugely populist, paternalistic and also very charismatic... Yushchenko is a liberal, democrat, European-oriented politician. Such ideological differences are very hard to overcome. There is jealousy and rivalry while reforms keep being delayed."

To put it simply, Nemtsov is a Russian politician first, and a Yushchenko advisor a distant fifth, or maybe sixth. He's never been particularly close to the YuGov and recently was pushed even further from the center. The last time his comments got this much press it was in June when he advised Yushchenko to fire Tymoshenko for trying to put price controls on Russian oil and a bunch of Ukrainian deputies called on Yushchenko to fire him instead for being cheeky. Yushchenko didn't fire him, but asked for a little more discretion and he's been an outsider ever since.

It is, therefore, not too surprising that he takes a dim view of the YuGov's future, but also begs the question of where he got the evidence to support his theory about Yushchenko and Tymoshenko.

Even Fewer People Talk to Pinchuk

Many publications have mistakenly called Nemtsov an insider, but Dempsey's NYT article does more. She attends a pro-European forum organized by Viktor Pinchuk and comes away saying: "At the conference, the staunchest supporters of the Orange Revolution from inside and outside the country could not hide their disappointment over the slow pace of change, seen as an essential step toward Ukraine's gaining entry in the World Trade Organization."

I'm bewildered, flummoxed, and stupefied. Does she actually believe the attendees of a conference thrown by Pinchuk (under investigation for snagging Kryvorizhstal at half price from Kuchma, owner of media that smeared Yushchenko ceaselessly during the election, big business oligarch of the Kuchma era, the epitome of everything the YuGov is supposed to be against, that Pinchuk) represent "the staunchest supporters of the Orange Revolution"? Not a bunch of political outsiders hoping to make up for missing the YuGov's "mini-Davos" in late June? Is she sure she hasn't mixed them up with a bunch of brave kids freezing their butts off in Kyiv?

It's not like there aren't things to criticize the government for, either. There's his son claiming ownership of the "Tak!" brand. There's the continued lack of progress on Gongadze and the cases of the Skeletons in the Cabinet. There's even more that I'll get into in later postings. With such a wealth of possible reasons for criticism, I earnestly hope to see more live news of our day and less Days of Our Lives news.