In politics, a crisis not only reveals the character of leaders but it exposes the essential nature and quality of that leadership.
The coronavirus crisis in Ukraine has exposed major deficiencies in the type and quality of leadership. These include the lack of national coordination and competence of those who have direct oversight in the battle against the spread of the virus within a health care matrix, the inability to “source” essential resources needed to fight the virus, such as tests, masks, ventilators, etc., the lack of a sustained, competent and trusted voice from the government that would adequately inform the public and which would create a calming effect on the populace, the inability to identify and pursue a myriad of options that would give high-level political decision-makers to make wise and informed decisions on behalf of the public good.
So what have we learned so far?
First. It is undoubtedly clear that the wrong people have been in charge of the health ministry. Tens of thousands have signed a presidential petition wanting Ulana Suprun to be brought back. She has the knowledge, experience and proven ability to be a crisis manager that the country needs, yet for some unexplained reason, Ukraine’s most competent minister of the last five years, remains on the proverbial bench. Why?
Second. The president promised that part of his change agenda would be his desire to appoint the best and brightest to positions of highest political office. One government has already been dismissed. Prominent business leaders remain on the sidelines. Dozens of experienced expatriates from Europe and North America with world-class expertise are not called upon. This is a broken promise.
The Presidential Office, now under new leadership, still has not developed a system of identifying, critically assessing, recruiting and appointing highly skilled individuals to government positions or to consult the president during this crisis. This is a broken promise.
Third. There is abundant evidence of a lack of macro strategic vision and coordinating expertise, not only in the critical health ministry but throughout the highest government echelons.
As recent as one week ago, friendly advisors to the presidential administration were reporting that the national government had still not established an effective national task force of government, health and business leaders to advise the president.
In conversations over the last week with administrators and politicians in Western Ukraine, the region which will most likely suffer most after Kyiv oblast, the major complaint was the lack of coordinating leadership from Kyiv. They feel abandoned.
Fourth. The crisis has revealed that Ukraine’s leadership remains reactionary and not proactive.
Fifth. What the crisis also confirms is that for at least the last two years, there has been a growing anti-Western resentment. Ukrainian governments want and need western monies, but hesitate and waver over the need to meet the obligations that come with it. Taking responsibility and accountability is anathema to Ukrainian political leaders. It is easier to accept money from China with supposedly no clearly evident strings attached. This is sad because there is a lack of knowledge and awareness of the long-term effects of this relationship.
Although Ukrainian leaders made a good decision to impose quarantine type solutions taking after Italy’s example, the ultimate government response to the coronavirus in Ukraine will not be a health-care based solution, but an authoritarian one based on a military/police matrix that will severely restrict the movements of citizens and impede Ukraine’s road towards liberal democracy.
At this moment, evidence strongly suggests that Ukraine will implement a state of emergency or a form of martial law that will impose the government’s will on its people because it did not have the ability and expertise to provide a health care based solution.
Democratic governments are considered successful by the level of confidence that they engender in those who elected it and in their ability to deliver their electoral promises in a competent manner.
Seven years after the Maidan and much talk of reform and change, Ukraine still lacks a definition of the meaning of good government and examples of governance that reject its tradition of authoritarian type rule.
In Ukrainian governments, there still doesn’t exist an agreed to set of criteria that would act as an essential guide for choosing and elevating individuals to positions of decision making political power.
For example:
- Do the people in leadership convey an aura of competence and honesty based on their abilities with a proven track record of accomplishment, whether, in government, business or the public sector?
- Are appointed leaders strategic thinkers who have the intellectual prowess to develop various governing options and who have shown the ability to develop comprehensive plans, while in possession of the tactical acumen to fulfill strategic objectives to get a job done and make fundamental changes?
- Do ministers or high-level governmental leaders have a Western orientation in their approach to management and the administrative skill that is essential to building democratic institutions? More simply, are they in possession of a dedication to democratic values and have they shown competence in governing according to these values?
- Do they have the ability to effectively communicate a governing message on a daily basis with integrity that would inspire confidence and create calm within the populace?
The replacement of the Oleksiy Honcharuk government was not a signal that the energy towards transforming Ukrainian society had stalled or was being abandoned as many western-based analysts surmised. Rather it was a grandiose reaction by the presidential administration to the growing lack of confidence in that government and in the majority of its ministers who were perceived as not competent and mostly ineffectual in accomplishing the Presidents stated electoral promises.
President Volodymyr Zelensky’s first government was full of young, unproven reformer types who clearly lacked experience in fulfilling and articulating the strategic missions of their ministries. The president, overtly concerned with his ratings as he always is, blamed and replaced them. The Ukrainian people gave him a ‘do-over’, not overly concerned, but nor were they surprised.
However, replacing ministers, using this as an excuse for little governing achievement or inaction, is a tactic that can be used once by the president. The next time and this seems to be the case in the handling of the coronavirus crisis, negative public opinion against the president will harden and a blanket of cynicism will dampen further faith in the presidents governing ambitions to effect change. It will severely weaken the president’s rhetoric weapons, making him ineffective after the first year of his term. People will have stopped listening and believing in him.
Word throughout the country about the government’s ability to properly manage the crisis is cynical, but then again, in Ukraine, this is nothing new about their view of government. Though Ukrainians allowed themselves to hope with a Zelenskyy victory, they are wary enough to have prepared themselves to emotionally deal with the disappointment of failed expectations.
But what may be worse, is the potential hardening of cynicism towards the efficacy of democratic type government, one that was fairly elected within a democratic context. People are saying that the government is not only incompetent but are raising questions as to why the government is actually needed, citing recent examples of volunteerism in the war with Russia, the unpreparedness of their fighting forces and the inability of the government to properly equip its fighters or to even feed its soldiers.
Health care workers are using social media to post the realities of the lack of supplies and coordination at hospitals. This surprises no one. Most Ukrainians want to find comfort with their families, not fully informed of the ravages of the virus can cause.
Western European governments are pledging millions to aid Ukraine. Money that is rapidly accepted.
In the last three days, I am aware of two major western investors in Ukraine, one from Britain, the other from Canada, who have pledged monies for supplies and offered their business expertise, organizations, and resources to wage the war against the spread of the virus. In the ex-pat community, many wait for a call to arms, but the phone hasn’t rung. These are world-class experts in their fields who chose to stay in Ukraine even though they had an option to leave. Many wonder why the president would turn to oligarchs for help and not them.
The coronavirus crisis will pass, but what is it that must be learned about the nature and type of leadership now prevailing in Ukraine?
First, there is a need to establish a recruitment system within the purview of the presidential administration that would be able to identify and recruit highly competent people to join the administration and government.
Second, there needs to be a recognition by the government of the need to further deepen the relationship between government and non-oligarchic private business that would establish a two-way relationship in the sharing of information, resources, strategic and coordination skills and for resource and service delivery.
Third, there is a need to put aside resentment and pride of Ukraine’s western partners. Ukraine must increase, rather than decrease western participation in institution building and management, especially those who have committed to living in Ukraine, recognizing that both the Chinese and anti-western oligarchs have a hidden agenda.
Fourth, a need to repent for asking Ukraine’s oligarchs to help in the crisis. The president must understand that you can’t take oligarchic money one day, and prosecute their corruption on another day.
Fifth, a recognition and a greater commitment to building a highly motivated and expert administrative and management bureaucratic class that is western educated both in the immediate and long-term future.
The president must learn and apply these lessons in the present crisis, and he must become aware that this crisis has direct and long-term effects on the reason he was elected.
Ukrainians mandated their government to bring fundamental change, bring into government the best and the brightest that are not corrupt and to establish a modern democratic state, finally breaking the tradition of top-level authoritarian rule that does not respect the dignity of individual citizens. It is not out of line to ask: Is Zelensky doing this?
