9th ANNUAL Ukrainian Best & Worst List 2011

By Oksana Bashuk Hepburn

Almost everyone has favourite lists this time of year - best movies, books, persons… For the 9th year, here is my list of the BEST and WORST issues, events and personae that have had profound impact on the global Ukrainian community.

BEST

1. Former Prime Minister of Ukraine and key political opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko - for her fighting spirit during her ‘show trial’.  She condemned presidential interference and the corruption of the judicial process thereby drawing a line between Ukraine’s present governance and where it needs to be as a full-fledged member of the democratic community.

2. Ukraine’s journalists - for tenacious pursuit of independence despite the fact that over 60 have died for the cause of truth since Ukraine’s independence. 

3. Canada’s Prime Minister, Stephen Harper - for a tough message to President Viktor Yanukovych, a letter in which Harper asked him to stand firm on his “commitment to democracy” and warning of “negative impacts” stemming from the politically motivated trial of Yulia Tymoshenko.

4. Canada’s House of Commons - for their commitment to keeping Ukraine in the democratic community by having a Special Debate on the erosion of democracy in Ukraine.

5. The European Council and Ukraine for finalizing the Association Agreement coupled with President Herman Van Rompuy’s strong signal: “politically-motivated justice in Ukraine”, particularly in the Tymoshenko case resolution, “will be a litmus test” for ratification. 

6. Patriarch Sviatoslav Shevchuk, Head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church - for urging Ukrainians to build a Ukrainian world in their homeland in response to the call by Kirill, Moscow Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church to Russophiles around the globe, and particularly in Ukraine, to build “one Russian world”.

7. Canadians, like Jonathan Kay of the National Post - for criticizing the Canadian Museum for Human Rights’ selective treatment of genocides.  The Museum position sends the message that the exposure of Nazi crimes against humanity is of greater value than exposing genocides perpetrated by Communist and other murderous dictatorial regimes.

8. Ukraine’s institutions and citizens - for respecting their Constitution, among them Arseniy Yatsenyuk, party leader of Front for Change, who condemned the Party of Regions’ parliamentarians for seditious remarks, and said those who hate Ukraine and do not consider it their country (numerous oligarchs) should forfeit their Ukrainian passports and go live elsewhere.

9. Ukraine’s Constitutional Court - for banning the use of the Soviet Red Army Flag as an official state symbol. 

10. Generous donors like Peter and Doris Kule, Erast Huculak, Ian Ihnatowycz, Dr. Maria Fischer-Slysh, James Temerty, the Stasiuk and the Wrzesnewskyj families, Petro Jacyk Endowment Fund - for supporting issues and institutions valuable to the global Ukrainian community.

11. The some sixty Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church youth from Canada who were among 2 million participants in the World Youth Day held in Barcelona for raising their Canadian, Ukrainian and youth day flags higher than any other hailing their commitment around the globe.

WORST

1. Ukraine’s political leaders - for failing to learn and apply the sine qua non of democracy: the separation of powers of parliament, the executive (administration) and the judiciary, thus putting Ukraine at the top of the world’s corruption scale and losing its formerly high ”free” rating.

2. European thinkers and leaders (except Poland) - for locking into the ‘old think’ regarding Ukraine and failing, for the last 20 years, to incorporate it into the European community, a mistake made after WWI and again after WWII with disastrous consequences for Ukraine, Europe and the World.

3. President Viktor Yanukovych and Prime Minister Mykola Azarov - for entering into agreements favouring Russia’s interests rather than Ukraine’s, specifically the Kharkiv Accords allowing Russia’s Black Sea Fleet  prolonged usage of Ukraine’s space; the creation of Ukroboronprom to facilitate defence integration with Russia; and the Free Trade Agreement aimed at Russia’s dominance of Ukraine’s economic sector.

4. President Yanukovych - for failing to understand the negative implications of the Yulia Tymoshenko show trial to his governance and to Ukraine.

5. Former President Viktor Yushchenko - for squashing compatriots like Yulia Tymoshenko; being soft on Russia; claiming that he “must run” again in the next presidential election; and otherwise transforming himself from favourite son into a Judas Iscariot.

6. Judge Rodian Kireyev - for discrediting Ukraine’s judiciary via his verdicts in the Yulia Tymoshenko trial. 

7. Women’s organizations in the diaspora and in Ukraine (except FEMEN) - for failing to support one of their own, Yulia Tymoshenko.  Their inaction on many aspects of this issue, including their silence after she demanded Prime Minister Azarov speak Ukrainian in court, is inexcusable in view of their commitment to Ukrainian as the country’s official language.

8. Ukraine’s Communist Party leaders, including comrades Symonenko and Vitrenko - for saying the Holodomor, the famine orchestrated by the Soviet Communist Party, is history and no longer important, and Israel’s President Shimon Peres - for lecturing Ukrainians to forget their history, Holodomor included, motivated, perhaps, by the desire to protect Lazar Kaganovich, also a Jew, and a key architect of the genocide.  

9. The Canadian Museum for Human Rights Board of Trustees - for selectively highlighting the Nazi genocide and under representing the equally brutal crimes of Communist and other dictatorial regimes thus undermining Canada’s law on equal treatment, and  government policy on Holodomor, and tarnishing Canada’ role as a global human rights leader.  

10. Signatories of the International Scholars Open Letter - for falling into the same intellectual trap as the museum: selective focus on Nazi crimes against humanity while under-exposing Communist atrocities.          

11. Ukrainian politicians, dignitaries and representatives - for failing to speak Ukrainian at international forums including Ukraine’s representative and runner-up to the Miss Universe contest.