Yevgeniy Shevchuk and Igor Smirnov |
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| Friday, 04 August 2006 | |
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Transnistrian speaker Yevgeniy Shevchuk has made so many tough statements against the West and Moldova that, as independent observers assume, in this respect, there is nothing to differentiate him from Igor Smirnov any longer, and he, as a matter of fact, compromised himself as an eventual alternative politician. And this process is underway. During the 31 March congress of Transnistrian deputies of all levels, Shevchuk spoke so sharply about Moldova that even Smirnov quoted him while calling on the participants ?not to be a colony of Moldova. On 12 July, the MPs, following Shevchuk??s insistencies, approved Smirnov??s initiative to call a 17 September referendum on the region??s ?independence and its subsequent ?free accession to Russia. Finally, in one of his latest speeches, he did not rule out ?Transnistria??s associate membership within Russia. Besides, Shevchuk repeatedly said that Transnistria??s people allegedly do not want a joint state with Moldova. It seems that he fulfilled everything that Igor Smirnov could have asked from him. Nonetheless the genuine ?captains of the Transnistrian boat do not regard him as one of theirs. The pro-Smirnov coordinative council of public organizations regularly criticize Shevchuk of ?capitulating to Moldova in his documents and statements. The body of the pro-governmental political movement, Za Respubliku (for the republic) newspaper, publishes in every issue ?letters by the readers, who ask one and the same question: do the speaker and the Obnovlenye party intend to ?concede the republic to Moldova? At the same time, everybody understands that Shevchuk cannot take independently any decision. Two people decide what he utters (or does not utter): Viktor Gushan and Ilya Kazmaly ?? the leaders of the biggest monopoly-company of the region, Sheriff, which put Shevchuk forward. They have a very big business, which is vulnerable to the region??s executive power. If it is to take into consideration that Shevchuk has no political biography of his own, then it is obvious that Smirnov, Vladimir Antyufeyev and the entire executive power do not struggle with the speaker, but with Sheriff??s economic power and political ambitions. Local social and political analysts consider that Shevchuk alone can hardly compete with the experienced public politician, Smirnov, who still keeps a part of the former charisma and a significant number of backers. In addition, before his election as speaker, Shevchuk dealt mainly with economic problems in the Transnistrian supreme soviet. But Sheriff has electronic media resources which are strong enough to compete with the state-owned ones. It is doubtful that Smirnov trusts Shevchuk??s ultra-patriotic and pro-Russian statements. He is aware that, through such courtesy, the company??s leadership seeks to secure itself and its business. Sheriff realizes that if the power, behind which are Russian servicemen and special services, will push hard on it, nobody physically will be able to help it. Now that Smirnov is getting ready for the referendum, and, at the same time, for the presidential election, he does not need an alternative centre of economic and political influence. It is plain and clear that the attack against the centre started by discrediting Sheriff??s potential candidate to the presidential seat ?? Yevgeniy Shevchuk. And the fact that, despite obvious attempts to manifest himself as an independent person, the young speaker keeps on playing on Smirnov??s ground and following the course of ?the general line of the party and government only eases the Transnistrian leader??s task. www.moldpres.md
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