[Marxism] Ukraine teeters

[Louis Proyect]

NY Times, March 2, 2009
Ukraine Teeters as Citizens Blame Banks and Government
By CLIFFORD J. LEVY

KIEV, Ukraine — Steel and chemical factories, once the muscle of 
Ukraine’s economy, are dismissing thousands of workers. Cities have had 
days without heat or water because they cannot pay their bills, and 
Kiev’s subway service is being threatened. Lines are sprouting at banks, 
the currency is wilting and even a government default seems possible.

Ukraine, once considered a worldwide symbol of an emerging, free-market 
democracy that had cast off authoritarianism, is teetering. And its 
predicament poses a real threat for other European economies and former 
Soviet republics.

The sudden, violent protests that have erupted elsewhere in Eastern 
Europe seem imminent here now, too. Across Kiev last week, people spoke 
of rising anger about the crisis and resentment toward a government that 
they said was more preoccupied with squabbling than with rallying the 
country.

The sign held by Vasily Kirilyuk, an unemployed plumber camped out with 
other antigovernment demonstrators here in the past week, summed up the 
pervasive frustration: “Get rid of them all,” it said.

Mr. Kirilyuk did not hesitate to take that further. “There will be a 
revolt,” he said. “And people will come because they are just fed up.”

Mr. Kirilyuk, 29, was standing in the same central square where throngs 
in 2004 carried out the Orange Revolution, a seminal event that brought 
to power a pro-Western government in Ukraine. He said he was a fervent 
supporter then of the protesters, but now he and a few dozen others who 
have set up tents here are demanding that the heroes of that revolution 
step down.

It is not hard to understand why world leaders are increasingly worried 
about the discontent and the financial crisis in Ukraine, which has 46 
million people and a highly strategic location. A small country like 
Latvia or Iceland is one thing, but a collapse in Ukraine could wreck 
what little investor confidence is left in Eastern Europe, whose 
formerly robust economies are being badly strained.

It could also cause neighboring Russia, which has close ethnic and 
linguistic ties to eastern and southern Ukraine, to try to inject itself 
into the country’s affairs. What is more, the Kremlin would be able to 
hold up Ukraine as an example of what happens when former Soviet 
republics follow a Western model of free-market democracy.

“Ukraine is a linchpin for stability in Europe,” said Olexiy Haran, a 
professor of comparative politics at Kiev Mohyla University. “It is a 
key player between the expanding European Union and Russia. To use an 
alarmist scenario, you could imagine a situation in Ukraine that Russia 
tried to exploit in order to dominate Ukraine. That would make for a 
very explosive situation on the border of the European Union.”

That Ukraine can cause problems for Europe was highlighted in January 
when Ukraine engaged in a dispute with Russia over how much it would pay 
Russia for natural gas, as well as over gas transport to the rest of 
Europe. The Kremlin shut off the gas for several days, and some European 
countries went without heat. The Kremlin also shut off gas to Ukraine in 
2006 in a pricing dispute.

While Ukraine’s economy is dependent on exports of steel and chemicals, 
which have plummeted, the crisis has cut deeply because people are 
disillusioned with the government.

President Viktor A. Yushchenko, a leader of the Orange Revolution, who 
garnered attention around the world in 2004 when his face was scarred in 
a poisoning episode, is so widely scorned that a recent poll found that 
57 percent of people wanted him to resign.

His rivals have also lost popularity, as the public has become 
exasperated by years of political bickering. In February, the 
International Monetary Fund refused to release the next installment of a 
$16.4 billion rescue loan to Ukraine because the government would not 
adhere to an earlier agreement to pare its budget.

Around the same time, Ukraine’s finance minister resigned, saying that 
the job had been “hostage to politics.”

On Friday, the monetary fund projected that Ukraine’s economy would 
shrink by 6 percent this year, and said that it was continuing to work 
with the government to find a way to disburse the rest of the rescue loan.

A presidential election is coming, probably to be held next January, and 
this prospect is making politicians, especially Prime Minister Yulia V. 
Tymoshenko, reluctant to adopt an austerity program that might alienate 
voters.

Mr. Yushchenko and Ms. Tymoshenko were pro-Western allies during the 
Orange Revolution, but have bitterly feuded since then, and he fired her 
once. A third rival, Viktor F. Yanukovich, a former prime minister who 
heads an opposition party that favors closer ties with Russia, also 
wants to be president.

On Friday, Mr. Yushchenko and Ms. Tymoshenko held a public meeting in an 
effort to demonstrate that they were working together. Mr. Yushchenko 
said he wanted “to show the readiness of all sides to take political 
responsibility for decisions which today are not easy.”

Even so, the two did not announce further anticrisis measures.

All over Kiev have been signs that tensions are building.

On the city’s outskirts, more than 200 tractor-trailer rigs were parked 
Thursday, their drivers threatening to block roads if the government did 
not help them with their debts, which they said were caused in part by 
the drop in the value of Ukraine’s currency, the hryvnia.

The truckers dispersed Friday, only after the government said it would 
try to address their demands, but they said they would be back soon if 
they were ignored.

“The government is to blame for all this,” said a trucker, Viktor V. 
Zarichnyuk, 26, who had been at the protest for 12 days. “We want the 
government and the national bank to agree that the money allocated by 
the International Monetary Fund, at least part of it, should go to 
regular people.”

At a branch of the Rodovid Bank across town, a tense crowd gathered 
Friday morning. The bank, close to failing, was allowing withdrawals of 
only $35 a day. And so people, some of them pensioners fearful for their 
life savings, have been trooping each day, ever more aggravated, to try 
to get what they can.

“Every day we come here — it’s insulting — in the cold and line up,” 
said Alevtina A. Antonyuk, 58, an engineer. “They are nothing at this 
bank but a bunch of thieves.”

Who is to blame, she was asked. Before she could answer, Dmitri I. 
Havrilkiv, 78, a retired crane operator, interrupted.

“The government has to be replaced,” he shouted. “They just can’t handle 
it!”