Viktor Yushchenko

I

Introduction

Viktor Yushchenko, born in 1954, reformist politician who was elected president of Ukraine in December 2004 and inaugurated to a five-year term in January 2005. Yushchenko won the election in a repeat runoff after his opponent’s declared victory in the first runoff was overturned by the Ukrainian Supreme Court due to evidence of vote-rigging. The court ruling followed weeks of massive pro-Yushchenko demonstrations—dubbed the Orange Revolution for his vivid campaign color—that paralyzed the national government in Kyiv (Kiev), Ukraine’s capital.

II

Banking Bureaucrat

Yushchenko was born in the town of Khoruzhivka, located in an agricultural region in northeastern Ukraine, which at that time was part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). He completed his undergraduate studies at the Ternopil Finance and Economics Institute in 1975 and then worked as an economist for a regional branch of the USSR State Bank in Ukraine. In 1984 he earned a graduate degree in finance from the Ukrainian Institute of Economics and Agricultural Management. He was soon appointed deputy director for agricultural crediting at the main State Bank office in Kyiv, holding the position until 1987. That year he moved to the Ukrainian Agro-Industrial Bank (later renamed Ukraina Bank), serving as a department director until 1991 and then as first deputy chairman of the bank’s board of directors until 1993.

By the time the USSR broke apart in 1991, Yushchenko had established himself as a highly successful and respected banker. He was named governor of Ukraine’s new central bank, the National Bank of Ukraine, in 1993. That year he met Kateryna Chumachenko, and they later married. (Yushchenko’s first marriage, to Svetlana Kolesnyk, had ended in divorce.) Chumachenko, the daughter of Ukrainian emigrants and a United States citizen, was working for an international auditing company in Ukraine when they met.

As head of the central bank, Yushchenko worked to develop the institution’s monetary and fiscal policies and to establish the foundation of a banking system in newly independent Ukraine. Yushchenko adopted a restrictive monetary policy in accordance with the requirements of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In 1996 he was credited with bringing inflation under control and ensuring the stability of the country’s new currency, the hryvnia. In 1998 he developed a series of measures that reduced the impact of the financial crisis in Russia on Ukraine’s economy. These accomplishments brought Yushchenko international recognition as an economic reformer.

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III

Prime Minister

In December 1999 the reelected president of Ukraine, Leonid Kuchma, appointed Yushchenko as the country’s new prime minister. Yushchenko’s government implemented many economic reforms with the support of centrists in the legislature, despite persistent opposition by left-wing factions. In 2000 Ukraine recorded economic growth for the first time since independence, and the trend continued in 2001.

Meanwhile, Yushchenko’s anticorruption efforts made him extremely unpopular with many powerful individuals in business and government. His own integrity was called into question when in March 2000 an investigation by the IMF confirmed allegations that the National Bank of Ukraine had exaggerated the size of its foreign-exchange reserves during Yushchenko’s tenure in order to qualify for IMF assistance. However, the IMF did not find any evidence to support allegations that Ukrainian officials had illegally diverted IMF funds.

In April 2001 Yushchenko resigned as prime minister after his political opponents in the legislature managed to pass a no-confidence motion against him. The appointment of a more conservative prime minister slowed the pace of economic reforms in Ukraine. Yushchenko went on to form a reformist opposition bloc, Our Ukraine, which won more seats than any other party or coalition in the 2002 legislative elections but fell short of securing a parliamentary majority.

IV

President

Yushchenko became the opposition candidate in the presidential race of 2004. His charismatic and photogenic qualities contrasted sharply with those of his opponent, Ukrainian prime minister Viktor Yanukovych. During the five-month campaign, their differences accentuated the country’s long-held cultural and political rifts. The more nationalistic, agricultural western part of the country backed Yushchenko, while the predominantly Russian-speaking, industrialized east supported Yanukovych. President Kuchma and the state-controlled media, as well as Russian president Vladimir Putin, also endorsed Yanukovych.

The election in late October gave a small lead to Yushchenko, triggering a second-round ballot in November. Yanukovych was officially declared the winner of the runoff election, but Yushchenko and his supporters rejected the result as rigged. Their claim was supported by international election observers, who reported flagrant and widespread voting irregularities. At Yushchenko’s urging, tens of thousands of his supporters staged nonstop protests in Kyiv and other cities to demand a new runoff election. Their demonstrations were soon dubbed the Orange Revolution for the prominent display of Yushchenko’s campaign color (also of his Our Ukraine bloc) in flags and clothing. Despite below-freezing temperatures, protesters in Kyiv set up a sprawling tent camp on the main street, filled the central Independence Square, and blockaded government buildings.

After several days of peaceful protests, the legislature declared the poll results invalid and recommended a repeat runoff. Then the Supreme Court, with final jurisdiction over elections, examined the case. In early December the court annulled the results as fraudulent and ordered the runoff, causing jubilation in the Yushchenko camp.

Meanwhile, in early September Yushchenko sought medical treatment in Vienna, Austria, for symptoms that he claimed were the result of deliberate poisoning by his political adversaries. He blamed poisoning as the cause of skin lesions that disfigured his face during the campaign. Medical tests subsequently showed that his blood contained an extremely high level of the most toxic type of dioxin, TCDD. Ukrainian authorities opened an investigation into the alleged poisoning.

Despite his health concerns, Yushchenko kept up a rigorous campaign schedule in the weeks leading to the repeat runoff, scheduled for December 26. He won the election with 52 percent of the vote. Yanukovych appealed the result with the Supreme Court, but it upheld Yushchenko’s election victory in January 2005. Following his inauguration on January 23, Yushchenko was faced with the daunting challenge of mending the bitter regional divisions in Ukraine. He made Moscow his first foreign trip in an attempt to smooth relations with Russian president Putin. Yushchenko’s priorities also included cracking down on the pervasive corruption in Ukraine and steering the country toward eventual membership in the European Union.

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