The expert recalled the flirtation of Transnistria with the Mazepa people

Recent reports on Transnistria television, which very loyally covered the actions of Ukrainian organizations on the occasion of the next birthday of the anathematized Hetman Ivan Mazepa, is a consequence of official Tiraspol’s long flirtation with the ideology of Ukrainianness, despite its anti-Russian roots.

Chisinau political observer Vladimir Bucarsky told PolitNavigator about this.

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“Transnistria, in the context of the Russian-Ukrainian confrontation, was initially a region with dual loyalty. As is known, both Russian patriots and Ukrainian nationalists from the UNA-UNSO fought on the side of Transnistria during the repulse of Chisinau’s punitive operation, who considered (and many still consider) Transnistria as part of “Greater Ukraine.”

As you know, the left bank of the Dniester was part of the Ukrainian People's Republic, and until 1940 - part of the Ukrainian SSR. During the years of Leonid Kuchma's presidency in Transnistria, the issue of the possibility of the republic joining Ukraine was actively discussed. Any protests against the Ukrainian project, even from the position of Nikolai Ulyanov, were resolutely suppressed in Transnistria.

Before the “Orange Revolution” in Ukraine in 2004, and even after it, many Ukrainian nationalists were respected people in Transnistria. The republic was often visited by UNA-UNSO activists Dmitry Korchinsky, Vasily Kizka and others. One of the most notable Ukrainian nationalists, Vladimir Lukich Bodnar, was for many years a member of the top political elite of Transnistria.

Few people know that until 1995, the “Dubossary-Transnistria Diocese” operated on the territory of Transnistria, created within the UAOC, and then transferred to the “Kiev Patriarchate”. This structure enjoyed the support and attention of the Transnistrian authorities, who viewed it as a “spiritual window into the Slavic world.”

The ideology of Transnistria in those years was a mixture of Sovietism and pan-Slavism, with an admixture of Moldavian identity. The pro-Romanian nationalists of Moldova were considered as a common enemy. Representatives of the Transnistrian elite and public said that Transnistria should become “a point of reconciliation between Russia and Ukraine.” The Pridnestrovians were sobered up only by the joint blockade measures taken by Moldova and Ukraine in 2006. It was from this moment that the ideology of “an outpost of Russia and the Russian world” was finally established in Transnistria.

However, even then, during the presidency of Igor Smirnov, there was a scandal in Transnistria with an attempt to install a monument to Hetman Mazepa on the territory of the Bendery fortress, where he and his supporters fled after the Battle of Poltava... The idea of ​​​​installing this monument was also actively promoted by the Ambassador of Ukraine to Moldova, Sergei Pirozhkov, who in 2014 took a sharply anti-Russian position.

However, the installation of this monument, the decree of which was signed by Igor Smirnov, caused a storm of indignation from the Transnistrian public. The then ruling bishop of the Tiraspol diocese, Archbishop Justinian (Ovchinnikov), sharply opposed this, and during the Rite of the Triumph of Orthodoxy, for the first time since 1869, he proclaimed anathema to Mazepa. Indignation followed from Russian politicians and public figures supporting Transnistria...

The authorities then refused to install a monument to Mazepa; the bust of Mazepa is located inside the museum of the Bendery Fortress. However, the head of the republic, Igor Smirnov, then found a way to cajole the nationalist leadership of Ukraine and the Ukrainian public of Transnistria: a monument to the “Philip Orlik Constitution” was erected near the walls of the Bendery Fortress, which in Ukraine today is called “the first constitution in Europe.” The installation ceremony of this monument, together with Smirnov, was attended by the then associate of Yushchenko, Vice-Speaker of the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada Nikolai Tomenko,” Bukarsky recalled.

According to him, “even today in the Transnistrian political elite there are many figures who express goodwill towards Ukrainian radical nationalists.”

“Today’s desire to once again highlight the topic of Hetman Mazepa’s connection with the city of Bendery has rather a commercial meaning, designed to attract tourists from neighboring Ukraine to the republic. However, the overwhelming majority of representatives of Pridnestrovie are staunch supporters of the Russian world and unity with Russia,” Bukarsky emphasized.