Last week, Hollywood filmmaker Mary Lambert, best known for directing thrillers, announced she was making a documentary about Ukrainian veteran politician and a presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko as an inspiring woman in political leadership.
The story didn’t get much attention in the news media and received some skeptical responses on social media. First, Lambert lauds Tymoshenko as “a powerful advocate for pro-Western values” and “fighter for human rights and radical reforms,” which seemed like part of the election campaign.
Second, this depiction of Tymoshenko as an empowered feminist leader was off-key.
Tymoshenko is one of four women running for the presidency in this election against 35 men. Her chances for victory are high: the latest poll from March 19, she ranked second with 18.8 percent following the frontrunner, actor Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
Relying on a predominantly elderly and female voter base, Tymoshenko’s election agenda doesn’t include issues that are commonly raised by Western female leaders: for instance, encouraging women’s participation in politics or closing the gender pay gap (according to the government envoy for gender policy, Kateryna Levchenko, Ukrainian women earn 72-75 cents for every dollar a Ukrainian man is paid) or fighting violence against children and women.
“When she became the first woman prime minister in 2005, there were very few women in politics. And we were interested in engaging her as an advocate for women’s rights,” recalls Larysa Kobelyanska, gender and politics expert. “But she is the product of her time and its fears, stereotypes, and narrow-mindedness.”
Tymoshenko tries to avoid speaking on equal rights or dicrimination, in order to not anger her conservative voter base. And when she has to, she keeps her opinion as vague as possible.
Speaking at the All-Ukrainian Family Forum organized by the Council of Churches on March 1, she briefly talked about happy families and the importance of spirituality, threw in some statistics on childbirth rates in Ukraine and cited Pope John Paul II. “We have to build our lives and the Ukrainian government based on the laws of the Creator,” she said.
“Tymoshenko is situational and careful to talk about ideas of gender equality,” says Kobelyanska. “In Ukraine, feminism is marginalized. She doesn’t want to associate with it and women’s rights organizations. But when she goes to the west, her rhetoric changes, and she speaks about rights.”
Another presidential candidate, Olha Bohomolets, is a fervent advocate for Christian values and pro-family policies to stop the Ukrainian nation from dying out.
Last November, the healthcare committee in the parliament led by Bohomolets, a medical doctor by trade, hosted a controversial round table titled “Scientific and medical approaches to the issue of gender equality” co-organized by Hanna Turchynova, a university professor and wife of the head of the State Defence and Security Council Oleksandr Turchynov. She is most known for anti-LGBT, anti-feminist, pro-Christian family statements.
The highlights of the “scientific” forum were speeches by church clerics, theologians, and other “experts” who talked about gender identity and gay propaganda. One speaker even claimed that safe sex promotion was propaganda of condoms.
Bohomolets also argues against quotas for women in the parliament. If women want equal rights and opportunities, they have to be ready for fair competition, she wrote in an 2018 op-ed.
Inna Bohoslovska, an ex-lawmaker running for president, appears to have more progressive views. In a 2017 interview to 112 TV channel, she shared the story of her daughter who suffered from an abusive husband.
“She left him and organized a group to fight violence against women,” she said. “Today, women became strong. Women communities stopped being jealous and became healthy groups of beautiful, smart, self-reliant women who have kids, families, men, and most importantly, faith in themselves.”
Currently, women in Ukrainian politics are still outnumbered by men. There are only 49 women lawmakers, against 374 men. In the government, women hold only six out of 25 of the top ministerial positions. n
