Monday, October 13, 2008

No court, no problem?

In my last post I wrote about the appeal of Yulia Tymoshenko party to Kiev’s District Administrative Court that led to suspension of the Decree of President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko calling for early election on 7 December 2008. Election officials refused to start preparations for the early vote after a court suspended the decree.

What happened next. To cancel the order of Kiev’s District Administrative Court Mr. Yushchenko’s office had appealed to a higher court – Kiev Appeal Administrative Court. They claimed that the Court’s order had no authority since President had already fired the judge before he made the ruling.

Today, on 13 October the things have got even worse. Both Tymoshenko and Yushchenko sent to the Kiev Appeal Administrative Court building the representatives of security forces “to prevent any illegal actions”. No one has crossed the line of law, but the situation was rather frightening. As a result – no agreement and no decision.

The way President of Ukraine have decided to resolve the “Court issue” looks a bit strange. He simply liquidated the Kiev District Administrative Court with his Decree No 922/2008 (of 13 October 2008). No Court, no problem.

The third potential candidate for a post of President of Ukraine in 2010 – leader of the Party of Regions, ex-prime minister and a “lost side” in the Orange revolution Viktor Yanukovych – who is not involved in the Court conflict (as today he doesn’t obtain any influential post) tries to raise his own rating, criticising his political opponents. In his statement, distributed by the party of Regions’ press service he stressed that the snap parliamentary poll must take place in Ukraine as soon as possible. “Force structures are already involved in the conflict”, he said, “This is a catastrophe”.

It seems to me, Ukrainian politics is in strong need of new faces. And also we should not forget, what the rule of law is.

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