Insuring failure – Ukrainian opposition

Now if you happen to be the opposition – ergo the minority – in any parliament, it goes without saying that getting the laws you support passed – or those you are against to fail – requires party discipline to insure the maximum turnout at any such vote, as well as erosive lobbying of those within the majority to gain support that goes against their party line.

Very difficult in any parliament and it is certainly not easy in a corrupt and self-serving cesspit  such as the Ukrainian RADA.

I have written previously of the critical and headline votes that the opposition could have won had they the discipline to insure their party members turned up to work as they are paid to do.  However snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is becoming something of an unofficial policy for the “United Opposition”.

After such public leadership and party disciplinary failures that caused the opposition to lose all 4 headline votes in the above link, you would think that thereafter the mandatory attendance of all opposition MPs would have been required by parties when bills they sponsor or support are up for vote.

After all what harm could the occasional victory over the government do for their image and the public perception of their effectiveness – let alone display weakness within the majority coalition occasionally?

And yet, Anatoliy Grychenko, a leader within the United Opposition on the Batkivshchyna Party list, now almost daily decries the fact that party discipline is non-existent, together with party leadership being noticeable by its absence.

Анатолій Гриценко
Опозиція має відрізнятися від влади!

Сьогодні Рада провалила два проекти опозиції. Опозиція допомогла їх провалити.

1) проект 2126 – про зарахування екологічного податку до бюджетів місцевих Рад. Логічний і правильний. Внесла Свобода, Сех. Опозиція активно агітує за підтримку. Голосування: Батьківщина – мінус 30 голосів, УДАР – мінус 15, Свобода – мінус 5 голосів. Разом – мінус 50 голосів!

2) проект 2503 – про охорону тварин і рослин від винищення браконьєрами. Логічний і правильний. Внесла Батьківщина, Томенко. Опозиція активно агітує за підтримку. Голосування: Батьківщина – мінус 42 голоси, УДАР – мінус 16, Свобода – мінус 4 голоси. Разом – мінус 62 голоси.

3) проект 2149 – зараз розглядається. Про адміністративні послуги, теж від опозиції, УДАР, Продан – результат буде аналогічним, а то ще й гіршим, бо в секторі опозиції все більше пустих крісел.

Не може бути виправдання такій недисциплінованості й безвідповідальності депутатів. Сектор влади теж напівпустий, але влада мене менше турбує. Турбує те, що опозиція – діє так само, а мала би задати інший стандарт поведінки. Говорю про це вождям і депутатам майже щодня. По барабану. Біда…

To save you translating, an environmental taxation bill (566) aimed at funneling environmental taxes to local government rather than central government, and vigorously supported by the opposition, failed because 30 Batkivshchyna MPs did not turn up to vote, neither did 15 from UDAR and another 5 from Svoboda.  A total of 50 opposition votes missing from a bill the opposition wanted to pass.

Bill 2503, drawn up by Mikola Tomenko relating to the protection of flora and fauna.  Tomenko is a man who sits amongst the elite of the elite in the Batkivshchyna Party and his bill faired even worse.  Despite his position in the party hierarchy, 40 of his fellow Batkivshchyna MPs, almost all of which his junior in both parliamentary longevity, party position and most importantly political ability, were absent.  Add to this another 16 missing from UDAR and 4 missing from Svoboda and that is a total of 62 opposition votes AWOL for one of their own pieces of legislature up for the vote!

Grychenko rightly summarises that there can be no excuse for such indiscipline and irresponsibility that the United Opposition is consistently displaying – quite rightly.  As he states, complaints about opposition leadership and deputies within are now an almost daily occurrence from within its own ranks.

Fair play to him for stating the obvious- not that the disunity within the opposition is a closely guarded secret.  It is obvious to anybody who cares to look amongst either the leadership, the rank and file, or both.

Leadership-less, discipline-less, rudderless and feckless – As far as the Ukrainian public and EU are concerned, this coalition will once again turn out to be hopeless – whether it regains power or remains in opposition.

So terribly sad that they cannot even muster being an effective opposition, as that would at least assist giving some credibility to any opposition presidential candidate – and whilst Ukraine is no doubt capable of suffering another Yanukovych term, one has to hope it won’t have to.

- And before I am asked who I would prefer to see as the next president of Ukraine – whilst it may read like anybody other than the present incumbent or Yulia Tymoshenko – it’s not – at least not quite.  In no particular order:

Klitschko (UDAR leader) – likely to run and likely to reach the second round if there is one according to current opinion polls

Tomenko (Batkivshchyna) – very unlikely to run which is a shame as he is a very competent politician

Poroshenko (Independent) – may run but will not get the votes his experience deserves

Grychenko (Batkivshchyna) – very unlikely to run as not enough support at the ballot box despite TV popularity in debates

In the unlikely event of an internal Party Regions competitor:

Serhey Tigipko

You see, if I had listed those who I would not want to see as the next president, the likes Yanukovych, Tymoshenko, Tyahnybok, Yatseniuk and the vast majority of each of the parties hierarchy, it would have been a very long list indeed!

The symbolic signing of nothing special

There is much to be said for symbolism.

It can be inspiring, it can be unifying, it can be a moment of hope or defiance that ignites the courage of others – in short, it can have impact.

It can also be completely empty of meaning, condescending, devoid of rationale and ultimately, pointless in the extreme.

And so, 18th May brought to an end the 2 month “Rise Ukraine” strategy of the United Opposition – Batkivshchyna, UDAR and Svoboda parties – in Kyiv.

After countless rallies in numerous (opposition friendly) cities drawing crowds of a few thousand people each time – worryingly low numbers if you are an opposition party leader to be blunt – the finale in Kyiv attracted a only few thousands people once again.

I would have expected for 10,000 – 15,000 after months of rallies leading up to a well publicised finale – and even that number would be disappointing.

All the issues I raised in the above link back in March have proven to come to fruition – not that it would take anybody with a modicum of common sense and even the most basic understanding of Ukrainian politics and society any effort to come to that same conclusion.

When adding all the reported attendance numbers from all the rallies over the past 2 months, it doesn’t even get close to the gate numbers of Manchester United playing an average team on a very wet and cold Tuesday night at Old Trafford.

To be quite honest I still have no idea why the opposition embarked on such a strategy that was so clearly doomed to failure.  I still cannot deduce why I was asked to “rise” over the past 2 months just to now sit back down again – possibly until October 2015 when the next presidential elections are due.

There has certainly been no impact or identifiable causal effect from the “Rise Ukraine” campaign, other than to identify just how few people the opposition parties have managed to turn out during this time.

Hmmm.

Anyway, back to today’s “Rise Ukraine” (anti)climax of the 2 month campaign, which saw the opposition party leaders sign a joint agreement in front of a pitiful crowd of about 4,ooo people relating to the presidential elections in 2015.

This agreement states that all opposition parties will support any opposition candidate that makes it to the second round of voting in the presidential elections.

That is a significant change in rhetoric from the past few months where is has been consistently claimed that a single nominee from the United Opposition would run.

Now it seems rather than a single opposition candidate to run against the current incumbent from the very beginning of any presidential election campaign (in the first round), the opposition leaders have failed (unsurprisingly) to agree on one of them running for the top job with the unified support of the others from the off.

Thus the plan after the least popular two have been eliminated in the first round of voting, leaving one to go head to head with Yanukovych, is to then unite behind their last man standing for the second round of voting.  A cozy little agreement granted – but will the opposition voters turn out in sufficient number in the second round to vote for a candidate that is not the man they voted for, not from a party they voted for, and does not share the same ideology as the man and party they voted for in the first round only a few weeks previously?

As Klitschko never seems to tire of saying, there are ideological differences between himself, Yatseniuk and Tyahnybok, and the parties they lead.  That is also true of their supporters differing ideologies.

Time will tell if opposition unification around a single presidential candidate after the first round of voting, rather than prior to any voting, will prove to be a sound strategy – I have serious doubts that it is a good strategy, although I also have serious doubts (at the time of writing), that Yatseniuk, Klitschko or Tyahnybok will beat Yanukovych anyway (even with full transparency and on a level playing field – which they may not get).

And so to the impact and underlying realities of the symbolic signing of the joint statement of opposition leaders,  pledging to support each – other only when they themselves have been eliminated from the presidential race.

The underlying  and sad reality is, there is little genuine unity amongst the opposition.  The impact of this agreement is almost zero, given that when all is said and done, ultimately, the public will be faced with the choice between Yanukovych or another in the second round of voting – opposition agreement or not.

* * * * *

On a completely different subject, there will probably be nothing from me tomorrow as I am doing something for the BBC – and their filming may take some time as I am not a great fan of being on camera, so single takes are very unlikely.   Thus I doubt I will have the time or interest to blog after being “Beeb’d” all day.

Asylum, Schengen and proportional representation

Now here is an interesting little story – somewhat comical to a degree – which leads nicely into Ukrainian voting systems.

Andriy Shkil, a former Batkivshchnya (BYuT) MP of the previous parliament, has been refused asylum by the Czech Republic, a nation well known for granting asylum via the historical legacy of Vaclav Havel who rarely turned an application down.

Why did the Czech Republic refuse his application for asylum?

The answer lays within the Schengen Visa system.

Although free to travel anywhere within the Schengen area once a Ukrainian has a Schengen Visa, they have to enter and egress the Schengen zone via the specific nation that granted the Visa.  If Poland granted the Visa, a Ukrainian who wanted to visit Italy for example, would have to travel there and back via Poland.

Personally I don’t know a Ukrainian who isn’t aware of the rules – although undoubtedly there will be some.

Logic would dictate, following on from such basic rules, that if an individual is going to claim asylum somewhere within the EU, that also will necessarily need to occur in the nation that issued the Visa, rather than seeking asylum in any EU nation an individual may take a fancy to.  Ultimately, a nation issuing a Schengen Visa must have some responsibility for their decision to grant – or not – an individual entry, for it is their decision and not that of any other Schengen area state who may well have made a different decision.

And so, in a way, it is rather comical that a one-time parliamentarian – an individual supposedly bright enough to have been trusted in creating and supporting – or not – Ukrainian legislature, has tried to claim asylum in the Czech Republic on a Schengen Visa issued by France.

Naturally, had Mr Shkil been reelected to the current parliament, he would not be seeking asylum anywhere but enjoying the immunity and impunity being an MP brings – and the fact he is not in parliament today it is not because he was beaten in any constituency seat, but rather due to his very lowly place on the Batkivshchnya Party list when it comes to proportional representation.

The Ukrainian electoral system is a mixed electoral system where 50% of MPs are those who take office through what is officially called Single Member District Plurality (or First Past The Post as most would recognise it), and 50% of MP seats are in parliament due to how high they are placed on their party list vis a vis the percentage of the vote their party gets.

Naturally all the top places on party lists go to the leaders to insure their place in parliament without having to go through the rigors of actually standing against another in the first past the post system in a constituency seat – as they may lose and that would never do!

Placed at 87 on the Batkivshchyna Party list, either Mr Shkil was not willing to pay enough to those who make the party lists to be placed higher, or he was such a poor performer during his tenure that his placing was deliberately done to insure he would not return to parliament.  Given the high number of poor performers on most party lists, he was either simply out bid or truly useless beyond comprehension.

Anybody on party lists lower than position 50 are in a precarious position and are certainly not assured of representing a party in parliament.  87th on a party list is a clear signal you will not get your nose in the RADA trough.

Even if we look at the ways of manipulating the proportional representation part of the vote, 87th place would simply not have been high enough to reasonably expect a return to the RADA.

If we look at the independent form of mixed electoral systems, then the 50% of first past the post seats run completely separately and in parallel to the proportional representation 50%.  This system can lead, for example, to a party winning all the constituency seats and then half of the 50% of seats allocated by proportional representation – thus giving a party 75% of the parliamentary seats.

Alternatively there is the dependent mixed electoral system, whereby proportional representation places parameters on the system, thus is therefore somewhat dominant over first past the post.  For example if a party wins 40% of the national vote, then their party members who win their seats through the first past the post constituency elections take their seats, followed by a remainder from the party list until it reaches the 40% of the popular vote it won.

Yes there are occasions under the dependent system whereby a party may win more seats in the first past the post constituency seat elections, than it should hold under its share of the proportional vote count.  Should that be the case, these “overhanging” seats in excess of the proportional vote are honoured and the parliament extends to accommodate the additional MPs for that session – whilst everybody else is represented by their proportional share of the vote.

None of this would have helped Mr Shkil at such a lowly place on the Batkivshchnya Party list – and neither would manipulating the size of voting districts – as Ukraine, for the purposes of its proportional representation, is seen as one big district rather than allocations on a proportional basis by Oblast (county) level.

Quite simply, the smaller the district, the smaller the number of proportional seats available, and thus the higher the percentage of the vote needed to win a seat.  The larger the district, the more proportional seats available, the lower the percentage of the vote needed to win a seat – not rocket science (albeit political science summed up by the formula X  1/(X+1)).

Anyway, enough of that academic waffle – Mr Shkil is now in France duly seeking asylum there.  The question is, will France grant it given that it is not normally that accommodating compared to the Czech Republic – a nation that was obviously Mr Shkil’s first choice when submitting his asylum application.

European Commission takes the next step in allowing for Ukrainian Association

Not at all surprisingly, on Wednesday 15th May, the European Commission took the necessary steps to draw up the documentation allowing for the Commission and Member States to sign the Association Agreement (and DCFTA) during the Vilnius Summit in November.

Such things do indeed take time when 28 nations have to agree to every word, phrase and punctuation mark on any document such as this.  Failing to do this now, and still have all national capitals agree with what is stated in time for November, would be something of an ask considering just how unwieldy the EU machinery is.

Naturally Ukraine is nowhere near dealing with all the issues that the EU institutions have demanded – but it has made some progress and may possibly address in their entirety, or significantly advance, many if not all of them prior to Vilnius in November – possibly to a degree where signing could be accomplished.

That is not withstanding the media headline issue of Ms Tymoshenko, who looks set to still be in prison by November.

The question is really whether the issue surrounding her will prevent any signing.

It is, after all, not that the EU or its Member States consider her innocent – nobody has commented on her guilt or innocence (officially) – but an issue of “selectivity”.

Now, there are those within the EU who feel that the Tymoshenko issue should not prevent the signing of this document – particularly given the year or two (minimum) it will take to ratify throughout all Member States – and thus a political lever of “ratification” can still be used against Kyiv over the Tymoshenko issue.

For example, it is becoming quite clear that influential States such as Poland and Sweden want the agreement signed whether Ms Tymoshenko is in jail or not – and it seems their lobbying on this issue is having some effect in Berlin over recent weeks.

There is also the old problem of interests verses values to consider – and with almost all EU economies in recession once more – and Germany only posting a +0.1% growth rate for the first quarter of 2013, opening up parts of the DCFTA on the basis of a signed agreement (if not ratified) will not do Europe any harm when it comes to easier trade and lower customs tariffs, thus increasing access and lowering prices respectively, with 46 million potential customers.

Will EU economic interests trump EU values as far as Ms Tymoshenko is concerned – even for a percentage point bump in economic fortune?

Is Berlin’s apparent softening due to Swedish and Polish lobbying, or the dire current German economic growth rate – or both?

Will Berlin actually soften enough to allow the signing by November – and how will the German elections in September change matters if at all?

There are also two sides to every “values” coin.  Should Ukraine as a nation be held at arms length over the singular issue of Ms Tymoshenko where it seems likely little progress will be made?  Will the Ukrainian public turn its back on the EU if that happens, considering themselves abandoned by the EU?  What of all the millions of Ukrainians who believe her guilty regardless of the standard of the trial or the selectivity of the prosecution?  The mass mobilisation of the public in her support has been noticeable by its absence.

Even the Untied Opposition, UDAR and Svoboda make only scant reference to her these days – albeit with on eye on the presidential election horizon, one suspects they would see her release as something of a fly in their ointment for several reasons.

It really is quite tough to call regarding the signing – or not – of these documents.  At the moment I am inclined to say they won’t get signed, although it would not take much to tip me over to a more positive view – and if 24 hours is said to be a long time in politics, then 6 months hence is  still too hard to forecast.

A Tymoshenko case dropped?

Apparently, although I have yet to be able to confirm it via non-Batkivshchnya Party channels, the case against Yulia Tymoshenko relating to involvement in the murder of Yevhen Scherban that occurred in 1996, has been quietly dropped – effective 26th April.

If true, a significant step forwards in the eyes of the EU one suspects, as it deletes one of a list of pending cases against her.

However, if true, very little has been said about it publicly by anybody – and you would expect the opposition parties to broadcast such a matter loudly – if only to undermine the abilities and motivations of the Prosecutors Office in the eyes of the public.

At least you would expect such an opposition cacophony unless there is a deliberate political move to distance themselves from the personality Ms Tymoshenko and the circus that surrounds it – and reasons for that there are a-plenty.  That is perhaps much easier to do now Sergey Vlasenko, her lawyer/defence council, is no longer a Batkivshchnya MP.

Hopefully corroboration from sources external and unconnected  to the Batkivshchyna Party will come soon enough, putting an end to yet another poor decision by the PGO of Ukraine.

Klitschko talks of time running out and personal sanctions

Only a few days ago, I mentioned a statement from Stefan Fule relating to no time extension for Ukraine to meet EU expectations in November.

As I stated, despite the bullish tone, this has far more to do with the European political calendar preventing any extension, rather than Stefan Fule developing a rigid, rather than flexible, backbone.

Let’s be quite honest, after 7 difficult years of negotiation for both sides – including some serious concessions by Ukraine – the EU would not normally throw that away for the sake of a few months if there were a few additional months in the political calendar to play with.

The fact is, due to national elections in very influential member states, notwithstanding the European parliamentary elections during the next 2 years, quite simply there is not much room, if any, to allow any political deadlines to slide for a few months.  A few years – yes.  Look to 2016 at the earliest after German, European parliament, French and UK elections to name but a few – including Ukrainian presidential elections.

Allowing any signing to slide until then, naturally removes the desire for political momentum on either side – raising the question of whether that momentum can be regained several years from now.

Even if the Association Agreement and DCFTA is signed in Vilnius in November, due to the same European  political calendar, ratification will still take years for the same reasons.

All blatantly obvious to anybody with half an eye on the European political electoral calendar.

Unfortunately, this seems to an issue completely overlooked by the opposition in Ukraine if Klitschko’s recent comments are anything to go by:

“Even if the association agreement is negotiated and signed, in order to have it ratified by all the EU countries, Ukraine has to comply with the basic political values and principles of the European Community, such as the rule of law, the absence of selective justice, real reforms, and democratic electoral law. To achieve this, Ukraine has much to do and the time is very short.

For our part, we, as the opposition, are pressing on the authorities to make them meet the commitments so that the country should not lose the chance to join the European community. If the Ukrainian authorities fail to adhere to the commitments, the issue of personal sanctions against officials cannot be avoided.”

Firstly, when looking at these comments, it has to be said that negotiations have concluded some time ago – indeed the agreements were initialed by both sides in March 2012, thereby effectively sealing them to major and significant amendment.  Thus it is a question of singing the already initialed agreements and no longer negotiating as Klitschko states.

The second paragraph in which he makes reference to personal sanctions on members of the existing government should it fail to adhere to those commitments is really not something that the opposition are likely to achieve – and they must surely be aware of that given the interaction they have with th EU and its member states – so why say it?

What are the chances of the EU placing sanctions on Ukrainian officials – seriously?

Not only are the outcomes of sanctions hit and miss and lengthy when it comes to getting any result, they are actually fairly limited in their scope.

Looking at EU sanctions, they consist of arms embargo, economic and financial sanctions and visa/entry restrictions.  No more and no less.

EU sanctions have proven to be of little impact to those individuals within Belarus to whom they are applied.  They are not being very seriously considered as far as a mirror of the US Magnitsky Act in respect of Russia and persons therein.

Applying EU sanctions to individuals within Ukraine, without for example, applying them to fellow EaP nation  Azerbaijan or individuals within government circles there – which has a far worse democratic, human rights, repression of freedoms and electoral manipulation record – would be difficult to justify to the European public.  Particularly so given the lack of impact and results in Belarus.

There is also a lack of EU diplomatic will to raise sanctions on individuals in Ukraine.  Only recently I spoke with somebody in the Brussels bubble (Chatham House Rule applied), and he stated that sanctions are not the way forward.  They are difficult to gain consensus over to implement, and even harder to then garner the consensus to  remove – and Ukraine has its supporters within the EU that would make gaining consensus over sanctions very difficult.

It is somewhere that sufficient numbers of EU bureaucrats do not want to go with regard to Ukraine.

Now if I am reliably informed of this, then surely this must have been made very clear indeed to the likes of Mr Klitschko and the other opposition leaders, who will have undoubtedly raised the issue several times – so why raise the issue again publicly if there is a high probability that it simply won’t happen.

When – as will more likely than not – sanctions against individuals are again publicly called for by the opposition, and again rebuffed by the EU – with a presidential election in Ukraine now on the horizon, how would any refusal reflect on the ability, authority and perception of international influence of any opposition candidate be in the eyes of the Ukrainian electorate?

There is much to be said for timing.  Being right and/or decent is not enough to win an election.  There is the overriding need to be convincing.

Time is indeed running out, not only for Ukraine to have progressed enough to allow the signing of the Association Agreement and DCFTA, but also for the opposition to stop the political showboating and empty rhetoric.

It is now time for the opposition to prepare their own political, economic and social policies ready for an effective delivery to the electorate by whomever is put forward as an opposition presidential candidate.  To frame their election campaign as “We were bad when in power, but they are worse” is really not an inspiring electoral campaign – and yet that is all that is currently on offer.

The first to frame the elections in a better way than that, will probably keep the upper hand.

ECfHR Tymoshenko Ruling

Since the European Court for Human Rights (ECfHR) released its first ruling (which is not final for 3 months from its announcement to allow for any appeals) on 30th April, both her supporters and detractors have been making some rather flexible interpretations about its meaning – far outside the scope of what is actually written.

What is true is that the court found serious fault with the old criminal code to which Ms Tymoshenko was subjected – a code no different to that employed to imprison the vast majority of the thousands of Ukrainians who also sit in prison today.

There was little doubt that serious fault would be found – otherwise why would the current Ukrainian government and parliament have created a new criminal code which finds far more favour with the European community?

Successive Ukrainian governments have known the old code to be seriously flawed – as did, undoubtedly, Ms Tymoshenko when she was Prime Minister only a few years ago.

Neither does it comment on her guilt or innocence for the matters over which she was prosecuted as some have inferred.

However such is the extent to which supporters and detractors have stretched far beyond what is actually written that somewhat unusually this statement was made by the ECfHR.

In short, the political motivations – or not – behind her trail and detention are not – yet at least – subjected to an ECfHR comment.  That is not what this ruling was about.

In several months, when her next case judgment is made, the issue of political motivation or selective justice may – or may not – be mentioned by the ECfHR – however it would perhaps have been far more circumspect to keep ones powder dry relating to that particular issue until that date if the opposition are to try to motivate and mobilise the public using the ECfHR as a driver.

Unfortunately, having made statements to the effect that the ECfHR stated Ms Tymsohenko was a political prisoner on the day of the judgment release, for that to then be refuted by Roderick Liddell of the ECfHR on 7th May, does not do much for the credibility of the opposition.

All the ECfHR ruling actually does (removing Ms Tymoshenko from the picture) is confirm to the Ukrainian public that the old criminal code was arbitrary, unfair, less than transparent, legislatively flawed in protecting by human rights and procedural normative – and that is not news to the Ukrainian public who lived under it for decades.

Fortunately, as the current government created a new criminal code to replace the old one under which Ms Tymoshenko was processed because it was so flawed, they will find it very difficult to appeal the ECfHR ruling whilst lauding their new criminal code as a major step forwards.

Anyway, far more interesting will be the Tymoshenko ruling due in a few months time – and whether political persecution or selective justice will be mentioned by the ECfHR in its ruling.

Ukraine – An energy hub – Be careful what you wish for

On Friday 3rd May, whilst I was enjoying my time off in the Odessa sunshine and taking in the beach life, Ukrainian Energy Minister Eduard Stavytsky had a meeting with the EU Energy Commissioner Gunther Oettinger (as well as Royal Dutch Shell and Exxon Mobil amongst others) in Brussels.

What became immediately apparent, if it wasn’t already clear before, is that Ukraine has decided that it can become a gas hub for the European continent and intends to pursue that strategy, making the most of its gas transport system and more particularly its vast underground gas storage facilities (50 billion cubic meters).

The infrastructure, whilst somewhat decrepit and thus in need of some serious investment, does at least exist already.

Very good – and an obvious goal to pursue given the soviet legacy Ukraine inherited.

But then there is the widely talked about “resource curse” to consider should Ukraine actually achieve its aim of both Black Sea Shelf and fracking production, transit and storage.  It may very well turn into an oil and (mostly) gas State.

Quite possibly a very good thing for the Ukrainian economy, GNI and indeed citizen income as well.

But at what social cost?

Of all 23 nations on the planet where 60% or more of GDP is derived from oil and gas – not a single one can be classed as a democracy.

Further all are very corrupt, almost completely unresponsive to the demands of their populations and have extremely low accountability amongst the political elite.

Looking at the Human Development Index which is a key identifier when it comes to identifying liberal consolidated democracies, almost all oil and gas States with 60% of GDP coming from those sources have extremely low HDI scores regardless of citizen wealth and GNI per capita.

That is not to say a low HDI score prevents democracy, of the bottom 46 ranking nations in HDI, 13 can be deemed a democracy of sorts and 2 of those, as liberal democracies.

Looking at the top 25 HDI scoring nations, only Singapore is not a democracy – and from the top 40 HDI scoring nations they are all democracies less Singapore and a few small oil and gas States (Qatar, UAE etc.)

Thus becoming an energy producing exporter and hub may well have dire consequences for an already “feckless” (per academic definition) political system in Ukraine.

One of the best ways to identify an effective and consolidated democracy seems to be to take the Freedom House score and multiply it by the World Bank anti-corruption score, and more often than not it closely mirrors the HDI position in the HDI league table – Spooky!

In fact, discounting the Islamic world, there is a very strong correlation between democracy, freedoms and any HDI score a nation has.

So becoming an energy producer and energy hub as planned will destine Ukraine to the usual fate of oil and gas dominant GDP nations with regards to democracy?

Well, not necessarily.

“Feckless” as the Ukrainian politics are and have been historically, there is nothing to prevent the current “feckless democracy” of Ukraine moving to a consolidated effective and possibly liberal democracy prior to the full  realisation of the energy producing/energy hub plan.  Should that movement to an effective and consolidated democracy occur prior to, or even simultaneously with the “energy plan”, then all may bode very well for democracy in Ukraine.

A very smart scholar named Przeworski has proven that (again removing the Islamic world from the equation) should the personal purchasing power of a nation reach a certain monetary figure (currently about $10,000, but a figure that needs to be index linked to remain relevant), then no democracy has ever crumbled.

In effect with a diversified economy and the average purchasing power per capita of $10,ooo or more, democracy is not only consolidated but invincible to the challenges of other governance models due to the middle class/ independent bourgeoisie.

Ergo, empirical evidence and academic works from the likes of Lipset, Prezeworski, Welzel and Ingehart etc, would all point towards the necessity of moving Ukraine’s currently “feckless politics” to an effective democracy whilst simultaneously trying to reach $X personal purchasing power and climbing the HDI league table if democracy is to survive any significant oil and gas increased share of the Ukrainian GDP.

The question is can the feckless political system stop being feckless before it leads Ukraine into the black hole of the resource cursed nations?  Looking at the entire Ukrainian political landscape and personalities within, that seems very unlikely without consistent external pressure and guidance.

All in all, an obvious and achievable plan for Ukraine – with very scary possible outcomes should it succeed.