Why Does Yushchenko Not Like the Ukrainian Diaspora?
July 7, 2008 – 7:41 pmThe popularity of Ukrainian leaders follows a pattern. First, public opinion turns against them inside Ukraine. Second, this is followed by Western governments and international organisations. We can see this tendency in President Yushchenko’s domestic and international decline in popularity. It is Tymoshenko’s – not Yushchenko’s – star that is increasingly outshining Yushchenko in Brussels and Washington.
The third stage takes longer. The Ukrainian diaspora is never in a rush to turn against Ukrainian leaders. Even after the Kuchmagate scandal the head of the World Congress of Ukrainians and his assistants would continue to defend the discredited Ukrainian head of state and complain about US Congressional and US Helsinki statements calling for the holding of free elections and the upholding of the rule of law. In traditional Soviet language the WCU would say these were tantamount to ‘interference’ in Ukraine’s internal affairs. The deputy head of the WCU told the OSCE in 2002, where I was also a long term observer, that Ukraine had held ‘free elections’.
Why then is President Yushhchenko afraid of the Canadian-Ukrainian diaspora media? During his 25-28 May visit to Canada the Ukrainian president or his secretariat decided to only meet Canadian, but not Canadian-Ukrainian, media. The Canadian-Ukrainian media was never allowed into any event that hosted the president.
The editor of the English-language section of one of Toronto’s oldest newspapers, Novyi Shliakh, was refused entry into the Economic Forum held in Toronto. The same obstruction to the Canadian Ukrainian media took place in Toronto at the Economic Forum.
Only the seemingly loyal media brought along from Ukraine was permitted to attend Yushchenko events and give carefully orchestrated and not difficult questions. Is this tantamount to media self censorship in exchange for a free flight to Canada? It would seem so.
A Toronto-based television producer for a Ukrainian programme told me that this was ironic because during the orange revolution Ukraine’s diplomatic missions in Canada and the USA invited the Canadian Ukrainian media to every event as it wanted maximum publicity given to election fraud.
What of Ukraine’s main achievement since the orange revolution – media freedom? It would seem that it is all relative. If the media is to ask too difficult questions then it cannot be allowed to do so as this might upset the president. As the Toronto producer said to me, ‘The Ukrainian press in Canada is informed and knows what to ask him. These nuances that are of interest to Canadian-Ukrainians are not well known to the Canadian media’.
In a democracy the media’s responsibility is to ask difficult questions, especially to a president in whom most Ukrainians are disillusioned and whose popularity has fallen 6 fold to only 6 percent. The Ukrainian (and Canadian-Ukrainian media) has every right to ask Yushchenko why he believes his popularity is so low. I have yet though to hear a Ukrainian journalist ask him such a difficult question. Perhaps that is why they are brought at great expense from Ukraine while the Canadian-Ukrainian media are ignored.
2 Responses to “Why Does Yushchenko Not Like the Ukrainian Diaspora?”
When everybody picks on you for being a failure and consorting with those whom you accused of election fraud, you resort to cherry-picking.
In Canada, that meant exploiting the Holodomor as a crowd-pleasing attention-diverting technique to sustain a spark of halo effect no longer found in Ukraine.
By Ukrainiana on Jul 9, 2008
The halo is declining in the West as a whole. the diaspora is a last bastion of support. In Toronto you have a large 4th wave diaspora which is far more clued on to Ukrainian politics than is the older diaspora. The 4th wave are heavily involved in the Canadian-Ukrainian media, such as TV, radio and newspapers.
By Taras on Jul 9, 2008