However, it’s highly unlikely that Viktor Yanukovych will free his main political rival any time soon, and the opposition will have to consider an additional option: Batkivshchyna leader Arseniy Yatseniuk or UDAR’s Vitali Klitschko.
The day after the Kyiv rally, market researcher GfK Ukraine released findings from a poll conducted in April that shows Klitschko would get a more than convincing victory if he runs against Yanukovych. According to this research, both of them would get 16 percent of votes in the first round, but Klitschko would get 38 percent against Yanukovych’s 19 percent in the second round.
At the same time, it’s too early for Klitschko to uncork the champagne bottle. This is a serious achievement for a politician whose party has just made it to parliament for the first time. But his real problems are only about to start.
As soon as public opinion picks him to be the main rival of Yanukovych, he should expect the propaganda machine of the powers-that-be to attack him the same way it recently did Yatseniuk and Oleh Tiahnybok, Svoboda’s chief.
One of the reasons for Klitschko’s success is that until now he has managed to keep quiet on some of the hottest issues, such as the debate around the status of the Russian language, NATO membership, and so on.
Also, the electorate has ascribed to him alone all the achievements of the rest of the opposition combined, not in the least thanks to the “warm bath” he was given by the state and oligarch-owned TV channels. At the same time, Yatseniuk and Tiahnybok have been under fire from those very media for a long time.
This would not be the first time when a presidential hopeful has such a honeymoon with his electorate, and in fact there are examples of the kinds of honeymoons he should try to avoid. Before the last presidential campaign, as the Front of Change leader, Yatseniuk grew in steeply in popularity.
By August-September of 2009 his rating peaked at 14 percent, and then, as a result of disappointing mistakes in his own campaign, combined with counter-spin from opponents, his rating dropped by half to just 7 percent.
To draw more analogies with the 2010 presidential election, it’s worth looking at Serhiy Tigipko, who polls predicted would do well in the second round of the election. But he failed to get into the second round, showing once again how volatile the electorate can be.
On the positive side for Klitschko, nobody from his parliamentary faction has thus far defected to the pro-government faction, unlike in Batkivshchyna. This has partially due to the support of presidential Chief-of-Staff Serhiy Lyovochkin, who has a number of proteges in UDAR.
The authorities have little interest in drowning Klitschko’s party at the moment. If the presidential team fails to help the “convenient” Tiahnybok get into the second round, Klitschko can be considered by the president’s advisers as a more accommodating opponent able to strike an agreement with Yanukovych.
Tigipko’s phenomenon in the last election indicates that Klitschko’s main problem still lies ahead: getting into the second round as one of the two top candidates. He should not be fooled by today’s numbers. On the eve of the October 2012 parliamentary election, sociologists said he could count on 22-25 percent of the vote, but his party only received 15 percent.
The reason behind it is Klitschko’s amorphous core electorate. He has proved this point in 2008, when in the mayoral election he was overtaken by Leonid Chernovetskiy and Oleksandr Turchynov.
Today, Klitschko is refraining from answering the question whether he will take part in the Kyiv mayoral election this year. A dominating opinion prevails among UDAR leaders that mayorship in Kyiv, complete with its housing and transport problems, would doom the presidential ambitions of Klitschko.
On the other hand, local UDAR offices clearly have some experience playing to the tune of their opponents from the authorities. Representatives of Svoboda and Batkivshchyna complained after the 2012 election that UDAR’s decision to not call off their losing candidates in some of the majority constituencies, cost the opposition some 15 seats in parliament. On the other hand, in most of the six races where UDAR members were clear leaders, both Svoboda and Batkivshchyna pulled out their candidates.
Klitschko’s stubborn refusal to cooperate with the rest of the opposition camp (which is nurtured by the authorities) can create serious problems for him in the near term. It will be increasingly difficult to believe in his oppositional stance if he continues to cooperate with the Party of Regions.
It’s interesting to note that Tigipko’s Strong Ukraine party walked a similar path recently. It started off as an alternative to the Party of Regions, and achieved impressive results in many southern and eastern regions.
By now, Strong Ukraine has ceased to exist, and Tigipko, once a promising politician who criticized the Party of Regions, has long taken the image of a pro-government politician.
Klitschko will have a chance to repeat Tigipko’s fate. That’s why it’s of utmost important for the opposition to show unity in their ranks and promote a real, high-rate candidate for the presidential election. This is especially important since the government is planning to amend the presidential election law to hold it in a first past the post one-round race.
This is why Klitschko should realistically assess his chances and test his candidacy if he plans to stay in Ukrainian politics for the long run. By doing so, he will also prove that this career is more than just a type of business activity.
Taras Berezovets is the director of Berta Communications, a company that specializes in personal and strategic consulting.
