When Radical Party leader Oleh Liashko said on Sept. 1 that his party was leaving the governing coalition after a bill on constitutional changes was passed the previous day, he exposed some of the fault lines running through Ukrainian politics. The unity of Ukraine's war-time government is now in question and that, in turn, could wreck the faltering peace process in Russian-occupied Donbas.
The proposed changes to the constitution require at least 300 votes. They attach “special status” to the Russian-occupied territories, which will be regulated by a separate law that will be passed once the area is returned to Ukraine as stipulated in the Minsk II agreement in February.
While the government has downplayed the significance of the bill’s wording, critics fear that the special status could translate into de facto recognition of the Kremlin and its proxies.
The Radical Party, Batkivshchyna and Samopomich factions opposed the bill, although five Samopomich members broke ranks and voted for the amendments.
That left the blocs of President Petro Poroshenko and Prime Minister Arseniy Yatenyuk in the uncomfortable position of relying on support from the Opposition Bloc, made up largely of former members of ex-President Viktor Yanukovych’s Party of Regions, to get the bill passed the first reading with 265 votes.
Denouncing this tactical alliance in parliament, Liashko concluded that a new coalition had effectively formed. It now consists, according to him, of the president’s and the prime minister’s factions, aided by a “fifth column of agents of Moscow” in the form of the Opposition Bloc faction and two smaller “oligarch groups,” as Liashko describes the Vidrodzhennya and Volya Narodu factions.
Pro-presidential lawmaker Oleh Musiy also quit President Petro Poroshenko’s faction because of the vote.
“I stand for the values of the Maidan” and that is not to cooperate with the Party of Regions, Musiy said. “We should have made the amendments (only) with our coalition partners.”
Liashko furthermore accused the president’s camp of playing into the Kremlin’s hands.
“These changes (to the constitution) were written in Moscow,” he said. “We are now in opposition to those in power.”
Now the fate of the nation has been left hanging in the balance, as the constitutional amendments are widely seen as crucial for Ukraine to retain support from Western partners in its defense against Russia’s armed aggression.
Proponents of the amendments, which transfer more authority and functions to regional and local governments, say they were part of what the protesters demanded during the EuroMaidan Revolution.
Still some suggested that the two other junior coalition partners could have used the uncertainty to do a bit of horse-trading.
Taras Berezovets, director of public relations firm Berta Communications, suggested that Batkivshchyna and Samopimich might vote for the amendments if they are offered more political influence.
“Poroshenko provide Cabinet positions. (Batkivshchyna leader) Yulia Tymoshenko wants a deal with Poroshenko. She wants to be prime minister,” Berezovets said.
If such a deal were to be struck, Poroshenko would secure around 270 of the required 300 votes in a second and final reading. Constitutional amendments require a two-thirds majority to pass, while regular bills only need a simple majority of 226. But it would still take party discipline and support from independent or former Party of Regions lawmakers for the president’s supporters in parliament to secure 300 votes.
“Then the West would be happy, no questions asked,” Berezovets said.
European Union and American officials have confirmed that they see constitutional change as a vital step towards the full realization of the Minsk II peace agreement.
However, with so many tangibles in play about the Poroshenko administration’s ability to muster 300 votes, prospects for the decentralization bill, and in turn the Minsk II process, have been thrown into doubt, Berezovets said.
Even getting the government’s day-to-day legislative business done in parliament may prove more difficult in the future. On paper, the governing coalition had a comfortable 302 majority before the Radical Party’s exit. But throughout the early summer the coalition often struggled to pass important reform legislation, due to bickering between coalition partners and lawmakers being absent from parliament. This had already led to speculation that the coalition would fall apart in the autumn.
Now the remaining four factions have to renegotiate the coalition agreement. If a deal is struck, the coalition will most likely shrink to 270 lawmakers.
While analysts agreed that the coalition isn’t dead yet, Yuriy Lutsenko, the leader of the pro-presidential camp in the Rada, said that the government would have to seek support from the Opposition Bloc on certain issues.
That won’t please the coalition’s fiercely anti-Opposition Bloc junior members. Samopomich lawmaker and Euromaidan activist Yegor Sobolev said in parliament on Sept. 2 that the government had to take the coalition seriously and negotiate on issues until a consensus is reached, rather than rely on Opposition Bloc votes.
Meanwhile, there is speculation that there is more to the Radical Party’s exit from the coalition than just anger.
Serhiy Leshchenko, a pro-presidential lawmaker and former investigative journalist, has said the move might be connected to the fact that criminal cases have been opened against key members of the Radical Party, including several lawmakers and its representative in government, Deputy Prime Minister Valeriy Volshchevskiy.
“It’s a preemptive measure,” Leshchenko wrote in comments on Facebook on Sept. 1.
He said there was no better defense against criminal charges than to claim there is a witch hunt against the “enemies of the Poroshenko regime.”
The move could also be a way to reposition the Radical Party ahead of the upcoming local elections, scheduled for Oct. 25. Analysts agree that there is currently no true political opposition, as the splintered remnants of the Party of Regions are weak and inactive. By moving into opposition, the Radical Party could take on the vacant role of an opposition force in the country’s political drama, analysts say.
Kyiv Post staff writer Johannes Wamberg Andersen can be reached at [email protected]
