Former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko
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The President Decided in Favor of His Corrupt Circle
// Yulia Timoshenko tells Kommersant the reasons for her leaving
The Fight for Power
Former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Timoshenko told Kommersant special correspondent Mustafa Nayem about being fired and about her political future.
Who are you for today? Are you in the opposition? The party in power?
Personally, I don't have to go anywhere, because I didn't break any promises. On the contrary, those who have betrayed the ideals of our revolution should go join the opposition.
Who is that?
I think it's the people who are under suspicion, who have humiliated Ukraine. Those who are not satisfied with the ideals of the Maidan should join the opposition.
Will you take part in the parliamentary elections?
We do not see any reason to take part in the administration that is being formed under Ekhanurov. I don't think that's the administration that our political forces would like to participate in. I am sure that out main goal is to carry out the parliamentary elections honorably and defeat them. After that form an administration that will characterize what people expected from us after the revolution.
Do you think you have a chance of being prime minister again after the elections?
Not a chance but a certainty that we will win the parliamentary elections. I have no doubt of that, to be honest. And then, of course, head the administration.
Do you think that is the beginning of a presidential campaign?
I think it is the beginning of the parliamentary campaign, because they are trying to eliminate all possible competitors. I know that the fight will be hard. The fight will come from those who want to wipe me off the political map of the country, and it will be dirty. But I fought for eight years so that my country took on moral ideals and I will follow that road to its logical end, until there is an administration that does not steal, officials that do not steal and a country that is free of that bondage.
Yesterday the president hinted at a press conference that, instead of working, you were busty with political intrigues.
I want to say that only the Lord can judge Viktor Andreevich [Yushchenko] and if he, if anyone who knows how I worked and what I have done also knows that the tales we told the people were life for me – he saw every action I made in the administration. I think that he has no grounds to say a single word of doubt about me. I know that people know that. That's why, when the president has taken on the function of saying bad things about me, he should just remember how I didn't leave my office for eight months, so that the promises we made to the people came to life and therefore it seems to me a great sin what he says, if , of course, he said that. I didn't hear it.
Do you bear a grudge against him?
No. I consider a grudge a bad state of being. I can say that I took the course of preserving unity to the end. And even three minutes before I went to that decisive press conference I was sitting near him and asked that we go together to the press to show people that nothing has been destroyed that things in the country will develop only positively. And I asked him to make a decision between me and his associates who are accused of corruption, to make a choice in favor of the administration, in favor of an honest country, but the president chose his team, that is, his close associates. And his team, his advisers, who have betrayed him, they gave him an absolutely radical condition – get rid of me at any price. Just because I wouldn't let them steal, because I wouldn't let them ruin the hopes of the people. And that was the main reason. The president made his choice. And I can't be offended at him, he's the president of the country. I will simply go my own way. Our political team will carry the Orange torch in its hands until everyone in the country understands that he didn't stand on the Maidan for nothing.
Petr Poroshenko says that you didn't want to take responsibility for the administration and that everything that happened was a premeditated political plan to be dismissed and begin an election campaign.
Maybe Poroshenko doesn't know that the president and I have a written agreement that I will go into the parliamentary elections with him and that I will support him in the presidential elections in 2009. The president has it, signed by my own hand. I never betray my partners and all I will keep all the promises I made. The only thing Poroshenko is talking about is what they sacred the president with. Because it was people like Poroshenko who had to be free of me so they could go about their deeds, not very honestly. So they told the president all sorts of horrors. But the president knows for sure that I won't betray him under any circumstances.
Have you seen the president since your dismissal?
No, I have had no contact with the president. But I think that we will go completely different ways now, I think that I will never work against the president – he is the president of the country. We will fight for the parliamentary elections to win them and form an administration.
What political forces do you plan to work with in the elections?
We will go independently. Of course, we won't have any bloc with Yanukovich or the Social Democratic Party or any other political forces. We will just go independently as a very self-sufficient power.
Do you see yourself becoming president or prime minister again?
Whatever I become, I will serve Ukraine and the people will determine who will be prime minister and who will be president. I would like the right to chose who should be what to remain with the people. Of course, I will fight for the post of prime, minister in the parliamentary elections. To do that, our forces have to win in the elections. Of course, we will take part in the presidential elections. There is no doubt about that. But I wasn't the one who made that choice. Viktor Andreevich Yushchenko made that choice under pressure from his associates. But I want to emphasize again that I forgive Viktor Andreevich, because it is not Christian to bear a grudge. I just want to wish him the fastest possible freedom from those people who are leading him nowhere, who are leading him to complete defeat.
What will happen to the Nikopolsky Ferrous Metals Plant?
That is a significant question. If the authorities hook up with Pinchuk for good, which would practically be with Kuchma, then the factory will be gradually returned to Pinchuk, in spite of the decisions of all the courts to return it to the state.
How will you comment on the accusation that you have an agreement with Privatbank?
Those who say that most likely don't have any information. I am the initiator of declaring the privatization of Privatbank's factories illegal.
Do you think Mr. Ekhanurov will solve that problem?
Life will show what will happen. I don't want to say anything bad about the acting prime minister. I only want to believe that they won't begin betraying the country and the people on the first day and they will act according to court rulings and not according to corrupt behind-the-scenes agreements.
Are you really counting on getting 50 percent of the vote or do you plan to form a bloc with someone in the parliament?
I am sure that we will win in the elections and receive 226 votes. But if it happens that we are short a few votes, we will have to form a bloc with someone, of course.
Now the [pro-presidential] Our Ukraine Party has broken up into the People's Movement and Party of Reform and Order factions. Could those factions be your partners?
I am sure that we will work with those parties, but I think the question of the form of the cooperation has to be deiced by both sides, by our political council and the political councils of those parties. But I very much want that cooperation to take place.
They say that the list of ministers in your administration was made up by the president, and you only confirmed it. Is that so? Will the same thing happen with Mr. Ekhanurov?
First, that really was so. That was a firm condition of the president's. Both the cabinet of ministers and the governors were his candidates and my task was to find common ground with those people and work as a team with continual provocations against me. But I was able to work on a team with all of those various people and there was not even one conflict in the administration. I think that Ekhanurov's administration will be formed the way mine was.
Who do you think will be in it?
I think that it will be partially holdovers. I can't guess who will be there, I can only say that Tomenko won't be there, nor Terekhin, nor me.
Will you get in contact with Mr. Zinchenko?
Yes. We have invited Alexander Zinchenko onto our team. He will join the most important ruling body of our bloc, our party. And I think that he is very worthy of it. It will be an honor for us if he joins our ranks.
Don't you think that your steps now – contact with Zinchenko, your statements about how you are the only one who bear the torch of the revolution, you statement about how you will become prime minister – is all indicative of your oppositional orientation?
No. It is just the honest and understandable course.
But now that course is at odds with the interests of the president.
I think that the people who violated the ideals of the Maidan are in the opposition. I continue to be that person who wants to carry on that spark that our people showed. I want to carry it to a complete victory. And I can tell you firmly that no one's opinion will interest me very much now except the opinion of our country and people. Not much at all. The time is gone when I conditions could be set for me on who to put on our party list, who to put on our team, who not to take. Maybe something will prevent me from taking Zinchenko, from taking Tomenko, form taking Brodsky or someone else. Maybe those conditions will be the last straw. You can give up a position, but you can't give up your views.
Tomenko will be with you too?
Yes, of course. We invited him and he accepted.
What fate do you think awaits Poroshenko?
I am sure that, whatever posts those guys hold, they will stay close to the president. They are his real team. No one from the team will fall on hard times. I wouldn't rule it out that even Tretyakov returned to his place.
But still, what can Poroshenko be appointed to? Only the prime minister and president are higher than the Secretary of the Council of National Security and Defense, and he won't be likely to want to go back to his old post.
I think that it is enough for him to stay on and it's not important to him where he goes from there.
If the president gets rid of his associates, could you work with him again?
I don't think the president will get rid of his associates. He made a choice between his corrupt associates and the administration. It was a conscious choice.
Mustafa Nayem
All the Article in Russian as of Sep. 13, 2005
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