Yatsenyuk is in charge of the nation’s reforms. He is in charge of filling his government team with the spirit of reforms and taking concrete steps to change our country. The mandate of the EuroMaidan Revolution, given to Yatsenyuk in February 2014 was used foolishly by him. His cronies have significantly improved their financial situation in these two years.
A big mistake is that our European and American friends simplify the situation, believing that Yatsenyuk is a sufficient counterweight to President Petro Poroshenko in curbing corruption. In Western political tradition, two big parties constrain each other from abuse: Republicans and Democrats in the United States, the Conservatives and the Labor Party in the United Kingdom., the Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats in Germany.
However, Yatsenyuk and Poroshenko are not opponents. They basically make up one party of an old guard of Ukrainian politicians with all their shortcomings who started in politics in the 1990s and 2000s. Instead of controlling each other, instead of competing for the success of reforms, Poroshenko and Yatsenyuk just agreed to divide the corrupt schemes and cash flows between themselves.
In Ukraine, the only effective opposition is civil society, young lawmakers and government officials — the “new blood” that was poured into the system after the revolution that drove President Viktor Yanukovych from power in 2014.
In an interview with the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung published on Feb. 26, Yatsenyuk tries to shift the responsibility for corruption on spineless Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin, Poroshenko’s puppet. But only the naive believe that Yatsenyuk was not aware of the scam that involved his close ally Mykola Martynenko, who has come under investigation in three European countries – Switzerland, Czech Republic and Ukraine.
The criminal investigation against Martynenko started by Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau relates to the events of 2014-2015, when Yatsenyuk was already prime minister. He’s linked to a uranium supply scheme from Kazakhstan to Ukraine that involves Austrian Steuermann company that earned $35 on each kilogram of uranium just for putting papers from one pile to another.
It turned out that the director of this company is a 70-year-old retiree from the Austrian village of Loretto. The documents I got from Liechtenstein revealed that the beneficiary of this company is a cousin of Martynenko’s business partner. Either Yatsenyuk was blind and did not know about the scam that was taking place right next to him, or it was done under his protection, which makes him an accomplice in the crime.
Yatsenyuk’s closest ally Andriy Ivanchuk is a business partner of billionaire oligarch Igor Kolomoisky. That was one of the reasons for blocking a law to reform Ukraine’s state-owned joint stock companies. The law was undesirable for Kolomoisky.
Yatsenyuk’s chief advisor on energy is Serhiy Titenko, who helped to “give birth” to the main power monopoly of Ukraine’s oligarch Rinat Akhmetov, who holds secret meetings with Yatsenyuk in the estate near the Kyiv Sea where Martynenko lives. Another result of the conspiracy is that Akhmetov preserved low state railway tariffs on transportation of raw materials for his energy and metallurgical enterprises.
Of course, Yatsenyuk’s ties to corruptionists and the oligarchs is no excuse for similar practices by Poroshenko and his network.
The system of checks and balances doesn’t work in Ukraine and law enforcement agencies are involved in achieving political goals. Poroshenko uses Shokin while Yatsenyuk uses Interior Minister Arsen Avakov.
Ukraine needs a complete reboot: dismissal of infamous ministers and the prosecutor general, stripping immunity of the behind-the-scenes puppet masters like Ihor Kononenko and the replacement of a prime minister who has lost the support of parliament, society and foreign investors.
The current coalition, even if it is saved with the help of populist Oleh Lyashko, is doomed because it would be not be based on European integration values, but on corruption. As a member of parliament, I saw Lyashko change his mind in a few hours and vote for the 2016 budget. It cost the country some Hr 265 million allocated to companies belonging to a member of his party.
Therefore, even if the government stays temporarily, we now need to have a Plan B ready – to dissolve parliament. But we need to get to a reboot with a new law on elections that will eliminate single-member districts and the selling of votes for Hr 200. Rampant television advertising should be banned and members of the new parliament should no longer have immunity.
Yatsenyuk’s interview in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reminded me of the events in Germany in 1974. Willy Brandt, then the West German chancellor, resigned after it became clear that his assistant, Gunter Guillaume, was a spy for East Germany. Brandt took political responsibility and didn’t destroy the ratings of the German Social Democratic Party.
This story could be a good example for Yatsenyuk about the importance of leaving in time so as not to drag the country’s hopes into the abyss.
Sergii Leshchenko is a journalist and member of parliament with the Bloc of President Petro Poroshenko.
