UKRAINE: WHO ARE THE PEACEMAKERS? BUILDING

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KIEV 000367

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/26/2016
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM UP
SUBJECT: UKRAINE: WHO ARE THE PEACEMAKERS? BUILDING
POSSIBLE POST-ELECTION COALITIONS

REF: KIEV 293

Classified By: Ambassador, reason 1.4 (b,d)


1. (SBU) Summary and Comment: The public political posturing
about potential post-election coalitions kicked off in
earnest January 24 with President Yushchenko's party Our
Ukraine releasing a letter calling for the forces of the
Maidan -- Our Ukraine, Tymoshenko's bloc (BYuT),Moroz'
Socialists, Kostenko's Ukrainian People's Party, and
PORA-Reforms and Order (RO) -- to work together in forming a
government. Rada Speaker Lytvyn's political forces were
pointedly left off the list. BYuT and PORA leaders
immediately claimed credit for the latest peacemaker
initiative, claiming Our Ukraine had responded to their idea.
Moroz suggested that non-Maidan parties like Regions could
end up in government to help bridge the Orange-Blue divide.
Rada Speaker Lytvyn has been running animated campaign ads on
TV depicting himself as the bridge builder between "Team
Orange" and "Team Blue" engaged in a tug of war. Regions MP
Makeyenko derided the Our Ukraine letter to us January 25 as
"empty words" designed to make Yushchenko look good in the
West, and suggested that the lines of communication between
Our Ukraine and Regions remained open despite a ploy to
decertify Yanukovych as a candidate based on his past
criminal convictions.


2. (C) Comment: The flurry of claims to the mantle of
bridge-building peacemaker is likely a reaction to public
weariness over constant political infighting. Public
posturing and talk of unity aside, privately the parties
continue to talk with a wide range of potential partners,
advancing conditions and probing for possible common ground.
The reality two months prior to the March 26 elections is
that no one can say for sure which forces will be in a
post-election position to form a parliamentary majority and
to negotiate a coalition arrangement. The two most likely
scenarios would be a government formed around a reunited --
for practical, not ideological reasons -- Our Ukraine-BYuT
partnership, or alternatively, an even more utilitarian Our
Ukraine-Regions accommodation. While reform prospects in the
short term would be brighter under the former, we must be
prepared for the possibility of the latter. In fact, the
longer-term workability of either potential coalition is a
legitimate question. End summary and comment.

Call for Team Orange to reassemble (with conditions)
-------------- --------------


3. (U) Our Ukraine Legal Department head Roman Zvarych
announced at a January 24 press conference that Our Ukraine
had sent a letter to BYuT, the Socialists, the
Kostenko-Plyushch electoral bloc, and the PORA-RO bloc
proposing to form a post-election coalition and divide
ministerial slots in the next government, as well as
positions in the Rada and other government agencies.
Zvarych's letter came with pre-conditions -- cancellation of
the January 10 Rada vote to dismiss the Yekhanurov, and
recognition of Yushchenko as the "leader of the Orange
coalition" -- and asked for answers by February 2.

Others claim credit (with other conditions)
--------------


4. (U) Four days earlier, during the January 20 "Freedom of
Speech" live talk show on ICTV, a wide range of politicians
headlined by Tymoshenko and Moroz had appeared jointly to
discuss the current political scene. After Moroz repeatedly
expressed his regret over the breakup of "Team Orange," PORA
leader Vlad Kaskiv suggested that the way out of the present
domestic political impasse would be an agreement on
post-election coalition building. Kaskiv said PORA-RO was
ready to help broker such a coalition. Tymoshenko reacted
with enthusiasm but said Our Ukraine also needed to step
forward. On January 24, Kaskiv told the press that the quick
reaction of both Our Ukraine and BYuT hopefully indicated
that principles rather than narrow interests were again
prevailing. Kaskiv stated there should be no pre-conditions;
nor would there be negotiations with "criminals and
Kuchmaists."


5. (U) BYuT deputy leader Mykola Tomenko also issued a quick
statement in response to the Our Ukraine letter, claiming
that Zvarych had merely responded to a BYuT initiative to
form a coalition and regretting that Our Ukraine had not
engaged on the conception forwarded by BYuT. BYuT supported
unity based on ideology and programs rather than personal
loyalty to the President, he added. Tymoshenko, speaking
later January 25 on Dnipropetrovsk TV, rejected a separate
Our Ukraine coalition proposal with a ten-page attachment of
proposed distribution of positions that she said Our Ukraine
campaign chief Bezsmertny had sent to her.

Lytvyn the true bridge or a Kuchmaist?
--------------


6. (U) For his part, Rada Speaker Lytvyn ran animated TV
campaign ads promoting himself as the country's true
reconciler bringing together "Team Orange" and "Team Blue"
locked in a tug of war over Ukraine. On January 26, he
slammed the Our Ukraine proposal as an effort to divide power
among a select group of parties. He also somewhat bizarrely
cited the intent of the January 24 letter to rationalize the
Rada's refusal to swear in nominated Constitutional court
judges since November, in contradiction to requirements for
the Rada to act within 30 days.


7. (C) Comment: Rada Speaker Lytvyn's electoral bloc was
pointedly left off Our Ukraine's list of proposed partners.
Notwithstanding his January 23 claim to A/S Fried that he was
a supporter of the Orange Revolution (reftel),Lytvyn was
never "Orange," pointedly refused to attend the November 22
Maidan first anniversary event, claiming "he would not
participate in a event which had split the nation," and
welcomed the highest number of former "Kuchmaist" MPs into
his electoral bloc. From the Our Ukraine perspective,
Lytvyn also played an unhelpful role most recently in
December and January, positioning himself and the Rada as an
alternative source of power and legitimacy to Yushchenko.
While post-election cooperation may still occur based on the
necessity to build a parliamentary majority, Our Ukraine's
omission of Lytvyn preempted criticism from PORA-RO and
Tymoshenko that Yushchenko sought to cut deals with "the
Kuchmaists."

Moroz: predicting Regions will be in government?
-------------- ---


8. (SBU) Despite his public longing January 20 for a
reassembly of Team Orange, Socialist Party leader Moroz, when
commenting on the Our Ukraine letter during an internet chat
session hosted by the web journal Ukrainska Pravda January
25, voiced his expectation that the post-election
parliamentary majority would likely include a non-Orange
party, specifically citing Regions, as a way of easing
Orange-Blue political tensions. (Note: it has been widely
presumed that the Socialists would not serve together with
Regions due to past mutual antipathy).

Regions MP: Empty words, everything remains in play
-------------- --------------


9. (C) Regions MP Volodymyr Makeyenko, who served as Our
Ukraine's deputy campaign chair for the 2002 Rada campaign
before defecting to Regions, dismissed the Our Ukraine
initiative to us January 25 as "empty words designed to
impress friends in the West." Behind the scenes, he noted,
conversations between Our Ukraine and Regions continued;
indeed, his phone rang soon after we arrived in Makeyenko's
office with an invitation from Presidential Secretariat
deputy chief of staff Vasyunnyk to meet Vasyunnyk January 26
at the Presidential Secretariat. Makeyenko claimed that he
and Vasyunnyk had served as primary negotiators for the
September 22 MOU between Yushchenko and Yanukovych that had
paved the way for PM Yekhanurov's confirmation vote.
Yushchenko had failed to uphold his commitments under the
agreement, Makeyenko charged, but the door remained open to
future Our Ukraine-Regions cooperation if Yushchenko were
more flexible.


10. (C) Makeyenko said that efforts by Zvarych and Interior
Minister Lutsenko (Socialist) to deregister Yanukovych as a
candidate based on his two youthful convictions had
temporarily infuriated Regions. He argued to us, however,
that a politically weakened Yushchenko, who truly despised
Tymoshenko as well as the Communists and the SPDU(o),needed
the experience of Regions MPs and leaders to unite Ukraine's
east and west and to provide more competent stewardship of
the Ukrainian economy. To wit, Makeyenko, who participated
in previous rounds of Ukrainian-Russian gas negotiations as
head of UkrHazBank, derided the amateurism of Naftohaz Chair
Ivchenko and Energy and Fuels Minister Plachkov; they had
been rolled by the more experienced Russians, in his view.
Regions leaders knew how to deal with Russians, particularly
since they viewed them as business competitors, he claimed.
"We know how to defend Ukraine's interests."


11. (U) Visit Embassy Kiev's classified website at:
www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/kiev.
HERBST