Ukrainian Elections- Worst Case Scenarios

By Walter Derzko

One person writing in Facebook summarises a dire prediction for the coming parliamentary elections in Ukraine: “Once again we remind people: during the elections [in Ukraine], actual elections will not take place.There will be two indisputable factors:

• Falsification [painting] of election results will occur in all election protocols (due to stacked committees)

• We will likely see mass beatings of those who do not agree with these results.

More: all current BYuT-Batkivshchyna faction members after October 28 will be sitting in pre-trial detention (SIZO) or in jail. This is today’s logical progression of events.

That is - the parliamentary elections have no relation to the ratings of political forces. Everything is going down to the fact that someone will be in power, and all others - in prison.

Who loses power – will probably be in jail. We will see either a revolution or mass beatings of people who dare protest. As it was in the past, so it will continue in the future.

The key to this is that the current regime [in Ukraine] can not act any differently – it’s just not tolerated and won’t survive otherwise. The current regime can not fail to fail – it has too big of a “tail” of past criminal exploits dating back to the 90s.  The regime can’t backtrack anywhere [stuck in a corner]. Just Like Putin in Russia.”

We are seeing more and more of this sort of sentiment on the Internet. This could be: 1) genuine disenchantment and resignation to the inevitable from all strata of society; or 2) part of a massive disinformation campaign to scare everyone, keeping “protesters in the kitchen” and off the streets; or 3) bit of justified opposition over hype to get more action from what is perceived as a lethargic West whose threats amount to only words and not specific actions.

It’s hard to tell at this point.

This follows the weekend plea for help and action from Yulia Tymoshenko and the results of a pre-election fraud report from Maidan.ua (source: Third Summary of “Maidan Monitoring: Election 2012” Project Findings http://world.maidan.org.ua/2012/second-fortnight-of-parliamentary-election-in-ukraine-the-system-of-a-violation)

In the Daily Mail UK story, Yulia Tymoshenko warns the West: “I would say dictatorship is currently in its active construction stage. Yanukovych has set a deadline for his ‘building project’ – the parliamentary elections this October.

“If he succeeds in his plan to falsify the elections, the President and his political henchmen will create a constitutional majority, and put the last nail in the coffin of Ukrainian democracy for decades to come.

“This may end with new revolution, but far from being as peaceful as it was back in 2004. That is why we Ukrainians need the help of the democratic world now – when there is still a chance to return Ukraine into the European family with European values – not after the elections, when it would be too late.”

Later she stresses: “Since 2010, Ukraine has become the private property of the ‘family’. Every dictatorship – including Ukraine’s – is deeply corrupt. That is why the first weapon against them should be to discover where they launder, save or invest their dirty money. The post-Soviet mafia wove a spider’s web of dirty money around the world. Where better to attack it than to start with the Ukrainian criminal heavyweights – the ‘family’ and its closest circle.” (source: Corruption? Murder? It would have made more sense to accuse me of starting an earthquake: Heroine of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution begs West to act against ‘Mafia Godfathers’ who have taken her country. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2196994/)

The difficult part is the West is almost helpless to act now. Multilateral promises of visa sanctions and asset freezes in Western banks, if they do happen, won’t be instigated until the elections and will happen without any public fanfare and in secret. When oligarchs apply for a visa or try to access an ATM or their bank accounts, they will find their money is frozen.

It’s their only trump card and it has to be used strategically. During the Orange Revolution, the incumbent Ukrainian President was warned by the Vice President of America: if you send tanks into the streets in Kyiv, we will freeze all your assets in the West. It worked.

In order to act concisely before the elections and to put pressure on the Yanukovych regime now, as Yulia Tymoshenko is suggesting, Western governments can, however, call for conditional sanctions… if you hold free, transparent and fair elections which includes the participation of Yulia Tymoshenko, Yurij Lutsenko and other arrested political prisoners, we may review or postpone action on sanctions.

The Canadian Long Term Observer Mission, which is now in Kyiv, also should publicly recap the pre-election situation in Ukraine.

But if the above worse case most dire scenario does take place, the West will need to immediately take a zero tolerance hardball approach to the corrupt Yanukovych regime.

Walter Derzko is the Executive Director of the Strategic Foresight Institute, Toronto