The first strong signal that Viktor Yanukovych was no longer the beau ideal of the Party of Regions faithful came in late December 2007, when senior party member Raisa Bohatyryova was offered and accepted the post of Secretary of the National Defence and Security Council. This appointment was in direct contravention of Yanukovych’s expressed wishes and suggested that a split was opening up within the higher echelons of the party, with Ukraine’s richest man Rinat Akhmetov no longer happy financing a party status quo which had just lost power via the ballot box for the second time in less than three years.
Staring defeat in the face
It is certainly not hard to see why Yanukovych’s supporters may have grown disillusioned. The September elections demonstrated yet again that as a leader Yanukovych was incapable of bridging the Ukrainian divide and winning over voters in the west and centre of the country. More worryingly, his party also conceded ground to arch enemy Yulia Tymoshenko in their own electoral strongholds. Party officials have since been forced to face the reality that they will lose the 2009 presidential elections if they continue to persevere with Yanukovych’s as leader.
The only man for the job?
It has often been said that the Kuchma regime was foolish to try and foist a candidate as divisive as ex-convict Yanukovych on the nation, with some commentators even suggesting that the government could have avoided provoking the Orange Revolution entirely if they had opted to back a less controversial candidate. This however overlooks the fact that no other figure could have hoped to motivate the pro-Russian vote like Yanukovych, or succeeded in rallying alienated voters with Soviet sympathies to the Regions standard. It would be short-sighted to suggest that he was the wrong man from the very outset, but even so it remains to be seen whether he can now continue to lead a party which is showing signs of disunity and unrest.
Replacing him with a new party leader of similar stature would necessarily prove an impossible task. We might instead be about to witness the emergence of a more media-savvy, less confrontational party that will turn away from the personality politics of the past few years towards policy-based positions. The Ukrainian political pantomime will be all the poorer for the loss of its all-purpose villain, but practical considerations may force the business groups who finance Regions to push for a major rethink in party policy.
All eyes on the presidency
President Yushchenko clearly sees opportunities for personal gain here, and is said to regard a friendly Bohatyryova as the key to the eastern electorate in the coming presidential elections. As Yushchenko fights to resurrect his presidency and staunch the surge in popular support for Yulia Tymoshenko, he continues to toy with the idea of a broad coalition linking his own Our Ukraine bloc with elements of the Party of Regions.
As well as appointing Bohatyryova to the prestigious Security Council post, Yushchenko has also recently issued a state medal to scandal-plagued senior Regions figure Boris Kolesnikov, a decision that was widely interpreted as part of the President’s attempts to build bridges with the Rinat Akhmetov wing of the Party of Regions. Both Kolesnikov and Bohatyryova are known to be close political allies of Rinat Akhmetov.
Transformation falls short
The departure of Yanukovych from the political stage would be mourned by satirists and casual commentators alike throughout the country. He has been a source of endless entertainment over the past three years of very public transformation from anti-Western rabble-rouser to baby-kissing champion of democracy. Ironically, Yanukovych has a team of American spin doctors to thank for his polished, media-friendly image, but few Ukrainians have been convinced that this newfound taste for stylish suit-and-tie combinations is evidence of a truly changed man.
Ultimately, most people will not remember the new-look Yanukovych with his perma-smile and carefully crafted statements. They will instead look back on the egg attack and the endless grammatical blunders, the garbled literary references and the fictional diplomas. Many Ukrainians may well even allow themselves a wry smile, because whether he stays or goes, it is already clear that Yanukovych has long ceased to be the authoritarian bogeyman of autumn 2004 and has morphed into something resembling a caricature of the old regime.
