UIA42.QXD 11/10/07 10:39 Page 1 N°42 - October 11 2007 Published every two weeks/International Edition CONTENTS ELECTIONS P. 1-3 Politics & Government c ELECTIONS The Elusive Winner c The Elusive Winner As we go to press, total uncertainty reigns in Kyiv over the political situation. The snap legisla- c Kiev: Leonid Chernovetsky tive election of September 30 resulted in a slim lead for the “Orange” camp, which obtained 228 seats on a Slippery Slope seat in the 450-seat parliament. However, as we suggested in our August 30 issue, the task of form- P. 4 Business & Networks ing a majority coalition is made complicated by the mutual wariness of Yulia Timoshenko – who made a breakthrough with nearly 31% of the vote - and President Yushchenko, who favors a “broad FOCUS coalition” that would include the Party of Regions, headed by Viktor Yanukovich. c Alisher Usmanov and special The Party of Regions, which garnered the most votes with 34.37%, has not yet made Rinat Akhmetov in the Orange report Camp’s Sights up its mind on what course of action to follow and is hesitating between going back into opposition or adopting an obstruction strategy. On October 1, right after the election, Russia, BEHIND THE SCENE which remained rather discreet during the campaign, reminded Ukraine’s political class of its pres- c Turboatom in Turmoil ence when Gazprom threatened to reduce gas supplies to Ukraine unless it paid back a $1.3 billion debt. A Balance of Power Largely Unchanged in a Deeply Split Nation. The first press agency re- ports, echoed without proper judgment by most of the western press, may have given the impression READ ALSO… of a landslide victory for the Orange camp and a personal triumph for Yulia Timoshenko. The latter has, of course, made a spectacular breakthrough, improving her score from the March 26, 2006 elec- In “Russia Intelligence” tion by over 8% (cf infra). Her party, BYuT, is now almost on an equal footing with the Party of Re- Last Issue gions. The pro-Presidential list, Our Ukraine-People’s Self-Defense, headed by Yuri Lutsenko, did KREMLIN quite well with a bit over 14%. But overall, the Orange camp has not progressed – its score is com- c Hunting scenes parable to the one of March 2006. At the time, BYuT, Our Ukraine and the Socialist Party - which, if in Moscow one recalls, claimed to be an heir of the “Orange Revolution” and intended to govern with Viktor GOVERNMENT Yushchenko and Yulia Timoshenko - garnered 41.93% of the vote. Added to that was the 1.87% of the c Vladimir Putin, Kostenko-Plyushch list and the 1.47% of Pora, which are not represented in the Rada. The total the improbable “Chancellor comes to about 45.5% of the vote nationwide. of Russia” The Party of Regions has improved its score from 32.14% to 34.37, but it has lost about 140,000 FOCUS votes since the last legislative election. If one adds to this the score obtained by the Communist c Who will take Gazprom? Party as well as that of two other allied parties which did not gain enough votes to enter parliament MINES (the Socialist Party, led by Alexandre Moroz with 2.86% and Natalya Vitrienko’s Progressive So- c The "peace of the brave" cialist Party with 1.32%), we get a total of 43.93%, the same score that Viktor Yanukovich obtained over the coal in Yakutia in the 3rd round of the December 26, 2004 presidential election. In other words, public opinion is as RAIL divided now as it has been for the past few years and the balance of power on the national level has c RZhD : Vladimir Yakunin not changed. Two blocs, each with about 45% of the vote, are opposing one another, with an addi- unveils his industrial strategy tional centrist party – that of former Kuchmist Vladimir Litvin - in the middle. The same geographic divide that has appeared since independence – and, oddly enough, since DIPLOMACY c Sergey Lebedev as the the second round of the 1994 presidential election which pit Leonid Kravchuk against Leonid saviour of the CIS? Kuchma – remains very strong (cf map). As in March 2006, Viktor Yanukovich has come out ahead in 10 eastern and southern regions – the nation’s most highly industrialized and populated regions. ALERT As anticipated, he obtained his best score in Lugansk (73.53%), Donetsk (72.05) and Sebastopol c Belarus : a good show by Telecom Austria (64.53). But he did not even pass the 3% threshold in the region of Ivano-Frankivsk. As for BYuT, it came out in the lead in 16 regions, including Kyiv, while Our Ukraine-People’s Self-Defense just barely managed to maintain its last remaining stronghold of Transcarpathia (thanks mainly to the influence of Viktor Baloga’s well-established connections in the region). SUBSCRIPTION Viktor Yushchenko Caught Between a Rock and a Hard Place. Ukraine’s president, who is Print Edition responsible for the snap election, is also its big loser (along with Alexandre Moroz, the head of the (23 issues, airmailed overseas) Socialist party). When the constitutional reform went into effect in 2006, Yushchenko’s powers were €385 TTC drastically curtailed in the de facto two-party system that was taking root in Ukraine. This situation is all the more frustrating for the Head of State who, as is well known, cherishes the ambition of get- Electronic Edition ting re-elected in the next presidential election scheduled for the end of 2009. (Print Edition + PDF + archives acess) If he wants to survive politically, Viktor Yushchenko is obliged to wage battle on two fronts – €440 TTC against the party of Regions, and against Yulia Timoshenko – by using intermittent tactical alliances. This is what lay behind his surprise declaration on Wednesday, October 3, d d d Continue page 2 www.ukraine-intelligence.fr UIA42.QXD 11/10/07 10:39 Page 2 UKRAINE INTELLIGENCE Politics & Government d d d From page 1 on the steps of the presidential palace Results by regions (Ukraine Intelligence special edition of October 3). Instead of announcing the formation of a “democratic coalition” be- tween Our Ukraine and BYuT, he called for dialogue between all the major political forces in the country in order to obtain- ing a large consensus – to the deep dismay of both his support- ers and those of Yulia Timoshenko. There are several reasons behind Yushchenko’s stance, which he reiterated during his brief visit to Paris on October 5 and later during his October 8 meeting with the leaders of the five parties represented in the Rada. The first has to do with his distrust of Yulia Timoshenko. The President retains a lukewarm impression of the first Orange government (Janu- ary 2005-September 2005) and has not forgotten that Yulia Timoshenko twice sided with the Party of Regions in a bid to marginalize him (during a vote of no confidence against the Yekhanurov government in early 2006 and on January 12, 2007 PR BYuT NU-AP PC BL during a vote on the competence of the government UI n°26). Crimea 60,99 6,92 8,23 7,62 3,91 Viktor Yushchenko therefore has no reason to take any delight Vinnista 12,55 49,97 18,59 4,96 3,14 in the prospect of cohabitation with Yulia Timoshenko, since Volhynia 6,72 57,59 19,99 4,59 2,72 there is every reason to think it would be anything but a peace- Dnepropetrovsk 48,15 20,93 6,32 7,62 5,1 ful one. The Ukrainian President also sets little store by Tim- Donetsk 72,05 3,92 1,63 6,05 0,87 Zhitomir 22,41 37 15,12 5,80 8,29 oshenko’s assurances that she will not run in the next presi- Transcarpathia 19,76 28,85 31,11 1,77 6 dential election. Zaporizhzhia 55,45 14,66 4,72 8,3 5,45 Two influential personalities within Viktor Yushchenko’s Ivano-Frankivsk 2,95 50,67 36,78 0,78 0,97 entourage are campaigning for a “broad coalition”: former Kyiv (region) 13,04 53,38 15,12 2,95 5,13 Prime Minister Yuri Yekhanurov and the Secretary of the Na- Kirovograd 26,99 37,57 11,67 6,43 5,54 tional Security and Defense Council (SNBO), Lugansk 73,53 5,10 1,73 8,48 2,4 special Ivan Plyushch. One may recall, in fact, that Lviv 4,19 50,38 36,02 1,03 1,1 reportViktor Yanukovich put up no objections to the Mykolaiv 54,4 16,6 5,83 7,18 4,53 nomination of the latter to replace Vitaly Gayduk last spring Odessa 52,22 13,72 6,49 6,16 5,12 Poltava 24,75 37,86 14,5 6,48 4,89 (UI n°34). Meanwhile, Viktor Baloga, Secretary General of the Rivne 10,41 50,97 20,76 2,4 6,11 Presidential Administration, is hoping to reap the benefits Sumy 15,69 44,45 20,74 5,81 3,33 of a potential PR-OU coalition by being appointed prime min- Ternopil 3,01 51,57 36,16 0,69 1,55 ister. Kharkiv 49,61 16,36 8,1 8,28 4,55 Meanwhile, the “Anything but Yulia” refrain does not go Kherson 43,23 23,03 9,07 9,09 3,66 down well in the pro-presidential party, whose leaders swore Khmelnitsky 14,05 48,16 18,41 3,95 6,62 only a few days before the election that, for nothing in the Cherkasy 15,5 47,03 15,25 4,86 4,93 world, would they negotiate with the Party of Regions, which Chernivtsy 16,79 46,17 20,32 2,29 2,54 they tend to demonize.