Symptoms of Prolonged Fever. Why There’s No Escaping a New Crisis in Ukraine

If one makes a diagram to show the change in the interest of European population to the events in Ukraine, you get a sine wave with high peaks and periods of deep fall. Too many shocks have happened in recent decades in a country that at the end of the 20th century had the greatest chance of becoming an advanced post-Soviet state. Today, Ukraine is consistently feverish, but there is reason to believe that another serious attack of the disease will come very soon. The new crisis in Ukraine is fated to be, and there are lots of factors that prove this. Ratings and intrigues Presidential elections are scheduled in Ukraine on March 31, 2019. Until September, the average results of ‘independent’ opinion polls said that not one of the applicants would get 15%. About half of the voters do not want to vote for the current president, Petro Poroshenko, under any circumstances. So, 13% of the respondents promised to give their vote for the leader of the Batkivshchyna party, Yulia Tymoshenko, and about 6% – for the current head of state. From 5 to 6 percent were ready to vote for the leader of the Civil Position, Hrytsenko, and the representative of the Opposition Bloc, Yuriy Boyko. The polls predicted 5 percent to Oleg Lyashko and Vadim Rabinovich. The number of undecided is quite high, and those who do not want to participate in the voting at all – about 30%. Vladimir Zelenskiy and Svyatoslav Vakarchuk occupy a special place in the ranking, although they did not announce participation in the race, but already enjoy solid support from the electorate. Apparently, for the first time Ukraine will have candidates from show business that became commonplace in Western countries long ago. However, there is already enough performance in political life. It is no coincidence that two thirds of the respondents are convinced that the presidential election-2019 will not be transparent. This confidence is reasonable: today, there is a struggle between the main political forces and candidates that has little to do with the concepts of democracy and transparency of the electoral process. A simple example: in 2017, PACE recommended that Kyiv renew the composition of the Central Election Commission in such a way that the delegates of all parliamentary factions are proportionally represented in it. However, at the beginning of this year Petro Poroshenko “forgot” to include in the new list representatives of the Batkivshchyna party of Yulia Tymoshenko, which disappointed PACE. The members of the opposition bloc were eventually returned to the list, however, the methods of forming the CEC remain absurd – under the law all its members must be independent and non-party, but so far they are all delegates of political parties and depend on them. In the meantime, while the two heavyweights of Ukrainian politics locked horns on the electoral and backstage field, a new coalition political force may emerge in the country. Opposition parties For Life by Vadim Rabinovich, sponsored by Viktor Medvedchuk, and Opposition Bloc by Yuriy Boyko, promoted by businessmen Sergey Levochkin and Rinat Akhmetov, may soon unite. Presumably, they are negotiating an opportunity of nominating a single candidate with great chances to get into the second round. If the negotiations are successful, then the potential alliance can get hold of impressive resources: starting with actually the largest pool of news agencies in Ukraine and ending with consolidation of voters of the Party of Regions in the east and south of the country. In addition, the consolidation of the assets of Akhmetov, Firtash, Levochkin and other oligarchs within one force will concentrate the largest financial resource in Ukrainian politics, which only the current president’s team can compete with. On the other hand, the political struggle of the coming years may have its main goal not even the presidency, but the control over parliament. So the struggle for it will not be easy. Electoral chaos Parliamentary elections to the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine of the 9th convocation should take place on October 27, 2019, that is, in a year. However, it is still not clear what electoral legislation will be by that time, although there is less and less time to change it. Since the 2000s, as semi-democratic political technologies actively developed in Ukraine, particular corporate interests were realized under the guise of electoral reforms. Since 2011, the country has law on a mixed electoral system, which makes it possible to get the number of pro-government deputies. It is no secret that in single-mandate constituencies, the one who has administrative resources and money to grease the voter wins. In addition, the party lists in Ukraine are closed (non-public), which means deputies can simply buy a pass-through seat from candidates who get the most votes. According to some reports, the price for this varies from 2 to 20 million dollars. Since the beginning of the 2000s, the Venice Commission has been demanding that Kyiv use a proportional electoral system with open lists in order to prevent such schemes. In 2017, PACE had already strongly recommended Ukraine to adopt a new Electoral Code and hold parliamentary elections under the proportional system with open lists – such a system works in many EU countries. Petro Poroshenko urged the Verkhovna Rada to change the electoral rules in 2014. The promise to abandon the mixed proportional-majoritarian electoral system was recorded in the Coalition Agreement between the factions of the Verkhovna Rada in 2015. But the old parliament did not reach this point, although abolition of the mixed system was one of demands of the Revolution of Dignity. Only 2 years after the electoral reforms announced by the president due to pressure from the G7 and PACE, the new Electoral Code was finally put to the vote in parliament. Oddly enough, it was supported by a majority vote. Ambassadors of the G-7 countries sincerely rejoiced, but the pro-government coalition was stunned: apparently, heads of the leading parties did not expect that they could get more than 226 votes. Some deputies do not hide the fact that the code was adopted on the first reading largely by chance and against the will of the president, who wants to keep the majority system allowing the right people to go to parliament. It is obvious that adoption of a proportional electoral system before the elections completely ‘spoil the game’ of the current government and seriously limits its chances for success. Probably, therefore, the draft law passes further just barely. The parliamentarians say that it’s ill-considered, making more than 2500 amendments since the draft was adopted on first reading. In fact, deputies are openly ‘spamming’, wanting to fail adoption of the draft law. Meanwhile, less than a month is left until October 27, and during this time the electoral system must be approved (after all, according to the principles of the Venice Commission, electoral standards cannot change less than a year before the elections). Today no one can say for sure what it will be in the end. Figures against reality The third key harbinger of new attacks of domestic chaos is thinning wallet. According to the draft budget, the government of Ukraine in 2019 expects record revenues in recent years of 1 trillion hryvnia, which is 10% more than revenues in 2018. However, taking into account inflation, the revenue part of the budget, at best, will increase only by its size. That is, a real increase will not happen. However, some budget revenues look very doubtful. In particular, the “privatization of large enterprises”, which in practice does not give the expected financial effect. For example, in 2018 only 50 million were received from the planned amount of 21 billion hryvnias from privatization in the first half of the year. In addition, a third of the budget revenues is supposed to be filled with taxes on the value added of imports to Ukraine, as well as raising excise taxes on own goods. This will affect not only tobacco and alcohol products, but also fuel and electricity, which ultimately results in their appreciation for Ukrainian citizens. The expenditures situation looks even more interesting and shows some interesting trends. First, the significant increase in expenditures on security forces – the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Security Service of Ukraine – which in a certain sense reflects expectations of the current authorities in terms of future situation in the country. Secondly, it is planned to increase the deficit of the pension fund at once by 20%, and to increase pension payments in a comparable volume in early 2019. Obviously, this is an entirely electoral measure, intended to increase support for the current government. To serve the same purpose, there is also an increase in expenditures on the Regional Development Fund, which majority deputies often use for their own purposes. So, as a result, the 2019 budget is filled with positives in the form of increased subsidies and social payments and increased pensions, but at the same time carries significant risks. It passed with a deficit, and a number of frankly unrealistic income items and a sharp increase in spending on security forces and social programs can only worsen its execution. So, already now the pension fund of Ukraine is complaining about a serious lack of funds, which has led to delays in paying pensions. Of course, next year, until the very end of the electoral cycle, the authorities will do everything to stop any financial negatives. But this will only aggravate the situation in the future. To summarize, the processes taking place in Ukraine today indicate starting another round of instability, which will inevitably spread all over the country in the near future. Two most important electoral campaigns simultaneously – presidential and parliamentary – could be a serious test even for a more stable governmental system. For Ukraine, where all interested political forces are ready to play unfairly, and the price of victory is extremely high, chances of passing painlessly through the electoral period are close to zero. Reducing financial and economic resources of the country will only contribute to more intensive fight, the result of which can be a new redistribution of the Ukrainian political field.