UKRAINIAN OPPOSITION PARTIES CAMPAIGN FOR RUSSIAN LANGUAGE
By Oleg Varfolomeyev
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
The Russian language issue has been employed in the run-up to the March
26 Ukrainian parliamentary election probably more actively than in any
past poll. Unlike in previous elections, where marginal groups and
low-key candidates played the Russian-language card, now such
heavyweights as the frontrunner Party of Regions (PRU) has made
elevating the status of Russian a key promise.
"This issue has a significant conflict potential, that is why it is
very tempting to use it in elections," Andriy Bychenko of the Razumkov
Center think tank said, presenting the results of a December 2005
nationwide opinion poll on the attitudes toward the Russian language.
The poll showed that more than 60% of Ukrainians are in favor of
raising the status of Russian, including 37% who believe that Ukrainian
and Russian should have equal status. The 1996 Constitution, however,
does not provide for any status for Russian whatsoever, but stipulates
that Ukrainian is the sole state language. Hence the high conflict
potential and temptation to abuse the issue.
Feelings about the Russian language are especially strong in eastern
and southern Ukraine, including Crimea. In those areas, according to an
April 2005 poll by the Democratic Initiatives Foundation and the
Kyiv-based Sociology Institute, support for the idea of making Russian
either a second state language or an official regional language hovers
around 90%. More than half of western Ukrainians are against this,
according to the same poll.
The parties that regard the Russophone eastern and southern areas as
their strongholds have been capitalizing on what they describe as the
authorities' failure to address the Russian-language issue. In the
current campaign, all those parties represent the opposition, while the
national-minded west and center of Ukraine have stayed loyal to the
parties that used to form the Orange Revolution coalition. Playing the
Russian-language card is nothing new for the radical leftists -- the
Communist Party (CPU) and the Progressive Socialist Party (PSPU) of
Natalya Vitrenko. Elevating the status of Russian to a second state
language has always been among their main slogans. In the current
campaign, however, they have at least two very strong rivals playing in
the same field: the United Social Democratic Party (SDPUO) of Viktor
Medvedchuk, who was a key aide to former president Leonid Kuchma, and
the Party of Regions (PRU) of former presidential candidate Viktor
Yanukovych.
One of the main slogans of the SDPUO's campaign reads: "Against NATO,
for the Single Economic Space with Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, and
for the Russian language." The text reads more like a communist
leaflet. The appearance of strong rivals playing in the same field is
arguably the main reason behind dwindling popular support for the CPU
and the PSPU. One telling example is the Russophone Donetsk Region,
which was the main electoral base of the CPU a decade ago, but now is
the stronghold of the PRU.
PRU leader Viktor Yanukovych, who routinely spoke Ukrainian when he was
prime minister in 2002-2004, ostensibly speaks Russian on his campaign
trips. The PRU's campaign brochure "50 questions and answers" promises
a nationwide referendum in order to give Russian "the state status, on
par with Ukrainian," as "56% of Ukrainian citizens routinely use the
Russian language in everyday life."
The PRU collected 300,000 signatures for a local referendum on the
status of the Russian language earlier this year in Crimea, which is,
ironically, the only region where Russian actually enjoys a special
status, according to the local constitution. Based on this, on February
22 the Crimean parliament voted to hold a local non-binding referendum
on the status of Russian on March 26, to coincide with the general
elections. The Ukrainian Justice Ministry, however, warned that the
referendum would be illegal.
For the moment, it is not clear whether the referendum will be held at
all. It is clear, however, that it will have no legal consequences,
which its organizers readily admit, saying that their goal is just to
raise public awareness of the problem. The Crimean Tatars, who back the
government in Kyiv, will ignore the Russian language referendum, their
leader, Mustafa Dzhemilev, told Glavred web site.
On March 6, the city council of Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine voted
to grant Russian the status of a regional language. President
Yushchenko's legal adviser, Mykola Poludyony, said the council's
decision was illegal, as the council had acted outside its remit.
Kyiv's official position is that there is no Russian language problem.
"This is speculation by certain politicians ahead of the election,"
Yushchenko said on a trip to western Ivano-Frankivsk last month. On
March 11, in his regular weekly radio address to the nation, Yushchenko
warned against "provoking conflicts around the language issue in the
heat of the election campaign."
(LIGABiznesInform, May 5, 2005; proUA.com, February 22;
Interfax-Ukraine, February 24; Glavred.info, March 3; Itar-Tass, UT1,
March 6; UNIAN, February 7, March 7; Ukrainian radio, March 11)
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