Last week's sudden eviction of the popular newspaper Kievskiye Vedomosti from its rented premises was only one of many incidents of intimidation, closure and court fines against newspapers throughout Ukraine. At first glance, it looked like just another attempt to deny free speech and crack down on any criticism of President Leonid Kuchma and his government.
By international standards, the newspaper's criticism of the government has been meek and run-of-the-mill, more parody than serious criticism.
In reality, the newspaper was the latest casualty in the war between Kuchma's clan on one side and the Hromada clan and its leader, former Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko, on the other.
Mikhail Brodsky, one of Kievskiye Vedomosti's largest shareholders, has joined the Hromada faction in parliament. He has used his newspaper to attack the government, and he has called for the government's resignation in very aggressive parliament speeches. Kievskiye Vedomosti is being used as a proxy in the war between these two most politically important and economically powerful clans in Ukraine.
The Hromada leader and the president, both of whom built their political careers in Dnipropetrovsk, were once partners. The Dnipropetrovsk-based clan engineered Kuchma's election, and consequently was well-rewarded. It has been estimated that up to 200 Dnipropetrovsk clan members were appointed to top executive positions in Kuchma's government and administration.
Clan leader Lazarenko, then the Dnipropetrovsk oblast governor, was initially appointed deputy prime minister in charge of energy. Other clan members were given almost all the ministerial portfolios involving industry. They included Volodymyr Horbulin, secretary of the National Security and Defense Council; Valery Pustovoitenko, current prime minister; and Serhy Tyhypko, deputy prime minister for economics.
In May 1996, Lazarenko became prime minister. He unashamedly gave the clan's major company, United Energy Systems, half the wholesale natural-gas market, thus helping it become the richest private company in Ukraine.
The main competitors for natural-gas profits came from the Donetsk clan, which was organized around parliament member Volodymyr Shcherban. That clan was swept aside with the assassination of another member of the Donetsk clan, Yevhen Shcherban, who by coincidence had the same surname as his political partner. The latter Shcherban was shot along with his wife and bodyguards on the tarmac of the Donetsk airport.
President Kuchma dismissed Lazarenko in mid-1997 without ever explaining why. Perhaps Lazarenko's sizure of the gas supplies at the expense of other clans became an embarrassment to Kuchma. The Dnipropetrovsk clan split in two and open warfare ensued.
Both sides use journalists and the mass media as weapons against each other. This technique was used to full effect during the March 1988 parliamentary elections. The clan wars were fought hardest in Kyiv, Dnipropetrovsk and Odessa.
In Kyiv, a Kuchma vs. Lazarenko war was waged on the pages of the newspapers Pravda Ukrainy, Vseukrainskiye Vedomosti and Kievskiye Vedomosti, which all supported Hromada.
In fall 1997, the Hromada clan suddenly boosted Pravda Ukrainy's subscription from around 35,000 to more than 500,000 by having an offshore company pay for the extra subscriptions. A similar deal was made with Vseukrainskiye Vedomosti. In return the journalists actively promoted Hromada as the savior of Ukraine, once again proving to the skeptics that journalism is intellectual prostitution.
The government shut down Pravda Ukrainy in January 1998, arguing that the paper's joint venture with an unidentified offshore company wasn't properly registered and that the Hromada-subsidized distribution constituted illegal campaigning under Ukraine's electoral law. Vseukrainskiye Vedomosti was shut down just before the elections got underway by a libel suit brought by the owner of the soccer team Dynamo Kyiv.
On the eve of the vote, the government discredited itself by arresting Brodsky, the largest shareholder of Kievskiye Vedomosti. In the months before the elections he and his mini-clan left Rukh to join Hromada as candidates for parliament. They aggressively campaigned against the increasingly unpopular government, using Kievskiye Vedomosti as their battering ram. On the eve of the vote, Brodsky was arrested, accused of illegal financial transactions and jailed during the voting.
Recently the former editor of Pravda Ukrainy, Oleksandr Horobets, was detained on the charge of rape, a case many believe to be politically motivated.
But everything seemed to turn out all right for Brodsky. He was elected to parliament mainly because of the jailing, as voters felt sympathy for him.
Today, Brodsky has taken another blow. But his newspaper continues to be published from the premises of his former Dendi bank, with most of the journalists working from home. The eviction has forced the newspaper to let go many of its staff members. Once again, journalists have become the main victims of clan warfare. On the other hand, with the continuing demise of the president's influence across Ukraine, the rebound of Kievskiye Vedomosti to greater heights of circulation seems inevitable.
Last December in Dnipropetrovsk, after a series of negative articles on Lazarenko and Hromada in one of the city's largest newspapers, its editor had acid thrown in his face.
The fight for power in Odessa was even more violent. Prior to the March 1998 elections, Mayor Eduard Hurvits led his troops in defense against an attempt by the Odessa oblast governor, Ruslan Bodelan, to take over the city's administration.
The clash took a bloody turn in August 1997 with the gunning down of Borys Derevyanko. Derevyanko, the publisher and editor of Vechernyaya Odessa, often fiercely criticized Hurvits in his paper. Soon after the murder, Leonid Kapelushyn, Hurvits' leading lieutenant and editor of the newspaper Slon, was assaulted, as was Hurvits himself.
Kapelushyn was also appointed by Hurvits to be chairman of the city election commission, not exactly a fair appointment for the opposition. On Feb. 16, someone shot Kapelushyn twice, seriously injuring him. On Feb. 28, Hurvits' protegee, Ihor Svoboda, was kidnapped. His body was never found.
In the March elections, Hurvits won a seat to parliament and was also re-elected Odessa mayor. But he soon lost control of Odessa. In May, Kuchma ordered the elite Berkut police to lock Hurvits and his supporters out of city hall.
Later a court banned Hurvits from running for election again in August. Bodelan, Kuchma's strongest ally in the Odessa region, became mayor, although it's hard to find an Odessan who admits to having voted for him. Hurvits remains a deputy in parliament, where he has linked his fate with Hromada's.
With a year to go before the next presidential election, the clan wars are set to intensify, as recent events illustrate. The government has undermined the finances of United Energy Systems, Hromada's cash cow, by impounding its bank accounts. The country's chief prosecutor has also announced that within three months Lazarenko will be charged with serious crimes.
The main victims of the clan warfare will again be journalists who pimp for either side. The unlucky ones will be those who lose their lives.
(A good review of how the clan war was fought through the media during the last elections can be found in 'Monitoring the Media Coverage of the March 1998 Parliamentary Elections in Ukraine: Final Report,' published by the European Institute for the Media.)
