Vol. 80/No. 10      March 14, 2016

 
(front page)

Two years after Maidan revolt
Ukraine rulers target workers

 
It’s been two years since sustained popular mobilizations by workers and others, known as the Maidan, in Ukraine toppled the pro-Moscow regime of Victor Yanukovych. Today working people confront deepening attacks on their living conditions and political rights from the capitalist government of billionaire President Petro Poroshenko.

At the same time Poroshenko’s government is increasingly fractured, as competing business moguls and their political spokespeople jockey against each other. Kiev also faces pressure from the International Monetary Fund, Washington and imperialist powers in Europe who demand greater “austerity” and “transparency” to advance their ability to make profit off the working people of Ukraine.

Ukrainian workers also face the effects of an ongoing military conflict with Moscow and the Russian government’s occupation of Crimea.

Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk narrowly survived a no-confidence vote Feb. 16, but two of four parties quit the ruling coalition, leaving the government supported by a minority in parliament.

The governmental crisis was precipitated by the Feb. 3 resignation of Economy Minister Aivaras Abromavicius, who accused one of Poroshenko’s deputies of attempting to impose his cronies in the management of state-owned companies. Ten ambassadors to Ukraine, including from the United States, Germany and other imperialist countries, immediately issued a joint statement lamenting Abromavicius’ departure and praising him for “implementing tough but necessary economic reforms” to help “bring Ukraine into compliance with its IMF program obligations.”

The economy contracted by 10.5 percent last year with inflation above 40 percent, a result not only of the worldwide capitalist crisis, but of the drastic impact on production and trade of the separatist war in the industrial southeast and the Russian seizure of Crimea.

The IMF has demanded Kiev cut pensions and other social spending; increase gas prices; privatize more state-owned companies, throwing tens of thousands of miners out of work; take measures that would supposedly rein in rampant corruption; and raise taxes on alcohol, tobacco and agricultural goods.

In December, the IMF ruled that Ukraine has to repay Moscow for a $3 billion loan made to Yanukovych’s government shortly before his ouster. Kiev so far refuses to pay.

There have been more skirmishes between Moscow-backed separatists and pro-government forces in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in recent weeks. Washington and European governments continue to press Kiev to adjust to the current unsettled reality. Washington sees recognizing Moscow’s efforts to protect its interests in what rulers there call their “near abroad” as a key part of deepening collaboration in imposing a semblance of stability in Syria.

Workers pay for bosses’ crisis

It’s becoming clear to more and more working people in Ukraine that the biggest obstacle they face in achieving any of the goals they fought for on the Maidan is the government in Kiev.

“While we watch Russia, we also watch the politicians of the new government,” Sasha Antoliavych, a former miner from the Donetsk region, told Militant correspondents on the Maidan in March 2014. “Most of them are not much different from those who fled.”

With no working-class party to lead a fight for power, this has proven accurate. In the last two years the bosses and government have sought to stabilize the crisis-ridden economy on workers’ backs.

Time and time again capitalists and government ministries in charge of state-owned mines and factories stop paying wages, sparking numerous strikes and labor protests. Coal miners in the west carried out a series of work stoppages in January, including blockading roads near the border with Poland. Workers at the huge rocket factory in the eastern city of Dnepropetrovsk rallied Feb. 11, also in protest of unpaid wages.

In retaliation, union members have faced physical assault. Mikhailo Volynets, president of the Independent Miners Union of Ukraine, accused representatives of Energy and Mining Minister Volodymyr Demchyshyn of beating union leader Anatolyi Mukhamedzhanov at the Novovolynsk mine in the company office Feb. 3.

Coal miners in the separatist-controlled Donetsk region have also held work stoppages over mounting unpaid wages. A Jan. 13 strike at the Makiyivka mine won some back pay, but 132 workers were fired, Halya Coynash of the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group reported Feb. 1. Now officials of the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic are threatening to charge miners there with “treason” for their strike.

The Poroshenko government has gone after democratic rights, including imposing thought-control “decommunization” laws. On Jan. 25 the Supreme Administrative Court upheld a ban on all activity by the Communist Party of Ukraine under those provisions, dealing a blow to the rights of all workers.

Meanwhile, the Russian government, which occupied and annexed the Crimean Peninsula two years ago, has stepped up attacks on native Tatar people. Moscow has begun proceedings to ban the Crimean Tatar council, the Mejlis, under a Russian law against “extremism.”

Leaders of the Mejlis have been imprisoned or banned from entering Crimea. The Mejlis offices in Kherson, Ukraine, near Crimea, were attacked with an explosive device Feb. 7.
 
 
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No miner has to die, in Russia or US!
 
 
 
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