Ukraine parliament sacks prime minister's government

Although Ukraine and Russia resolved the crisis for the time being when they agreed to new gas prices last week, the parliament described the deal as " traitorous," reports The Independent of London, and ousted Prime Minister Yuri Yekhanurov's government in response.

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[Members of parliament and opposition groups] said yesterday they were unhappy with the government's handling of the crisis and accused it of selling out to Russia and betraying national interests.

The motion to sack the government, which appeared to take many MPs by surprise, was backed by 250 of the parliament's 450 members. Mr Yushchenko's former ally and one-time prime minister, Julia Tymoshenko, was among those who voted against the government, along with the Communist party.

However, President Yushchenko, who came to power during 2004's " Orange Revolution" and appointed Mr. Yekhanurov as prime minister in September 2005, said that the parliament lacked the authority to pass the measure, reports the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, as the parliament's power to dismiss the prime minister has not yet been constitutionalized.

Yushchenko is calling the no-confidence vote politically motivated. It is expected the government will remain in place until parliamentary elections which are scheduled in March.

Under Ukraine's 1996 constitution, the president appoints the prime minister with the consent of parliament and the prime minister proposes a list of cabinet ministers. Constitutional reforms adopted last year gave parliament power to appoint the cabinet, but experts differ on whether and when it can fire the ministers.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuri Yekhanurov said the motion will have no effect.

At the crux of the debate over the sacking is whether the standing parliament has the authority to dismiss the prime minister. While the constitutional amendments allowing such an action were adopted Jan. 1, Yushchenko and Yekhanurov claim that only the parliament set to be elected in March will have such an ability.

However, some analysts believe that the parliament's move was more about gaining " political leverage" than responding to the gas crisis, reports the Los Angeles Times.

"The pretext was the [gas] contract which was much worse than all the previous contracts. But the main reason, I think, is the desire of the parliament speaker to gain hold of the main levers of the election campaign," Socialist Party deputy Mikola Rudkovsky, who sat out the vote, said in a telephone interview.

Vladimir Fesenko, director of the Kiev-based Penta Center for Applied Political Studies, predicted any change of government would come after the election.

"The fact is that Yekhanurov leads the election list of the presidential bloc, Our Ukraine, and the parliament took the opportunity to show that a majority of political forces in the country do not support the policies of Yekhanurov," Fesenko said.

The New York Times adds that the parliament's decision could also have been driven by pro-Russian parties within Ukraine.

... Some analysts said the gas deal had damaged the election prospects of the country's pro-Russian forces, which make up a part of the opposition. The no-confidence vote, they said, was intended to mitigate the damage.

"This is an attempt by the political opposition in Ukraine to seize political initiative from President Yushchenko's camp ahead of the March election," Sergei Voloboev, an economist with CSFB, the investment bank, told Reuters.

In practical terms, the no-confidence vote will not force the prime minister and his cabinet to vacate their posts before the March elections, reports Voice of America. However, it could effectively prevent the government from lawmaking.

Even if he is forced out of office, Mr. Yekhanurov will remain acting prime minister until a new Cabinet is named, and Ukraine's justice minister, Serhiy Holovaty, says only the new parliament that will be elected in March can form a new government.

An opposition lawmaker in Kiev agrees that current government ministers should remain at their posts. He says parliament's dismissal order was intended to strip Mr. Yekhuranov's government of decision-making powers.

Nonetheless, the vote is prompting dismay from pro-government and opposition bodies alike. According to a BBC survey of Ukrainian daily newspapers, pro-government dailies are bemoaning the parliament's decision as "petty."

"Looking for some deep meaning in parliament's decision yesterday is as dangerous as diving in shallow waters - you expect some depth but instead break your neck," fumes the popular tabloid Gazeta po-Kievski.

"The petty nature of this move by the parliamentary has-beens is obvious, considering that they cannot really replace the cabinet. The oppositionists simply could not deny themselves the little spoilsport pleasure of giving cabinet ministers the 'acting' prefix."

The pro-government Ukrayina Moloda echoes the sentiment. "MPs have proved that whenever they want to demonstrate their strength, need some money or have some other suitable reason, they will be able to sack the government almost every day if they care to," the daily says.

Meanwhile, Segodnya, an opposition paper, notes similarities between the Ukraine's current crisis and that between Boris Yeltsin and the Russian parliament in 1993.

It concludes: "In 1993 in Moscow, when Boris Yeltsin shut down a hostile parliament by his decree, things ended with the parliament building coming under fire and the adoption of a new constitution, which drastically increased presidential powers."

Though his party has called for him to impose direct presidential rule, Yushchenko has said he would not " resort to pressure on parliament," reports the Los Angeles Times.

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