First interview in freedom: Vasily Volga returns to Ukrainian politics

Kyiv, January 12 (PolitNavigator, Vladimir Mikhailov) – In Kyiv again at large Vasily Volga, party leader "Union of Left Forces", which several years ago claimed to be an alternative to the Communist Party. According to the politician himself, this is what led to him soon going to jail.

In 2012, Volga, who headed the State Financial Services Agency, ended up in prison - he was sentenced to five years in prison on charges of attempted bribery.

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The release occurred at the end of December, and he agreed to give the first interview "Politnavigator".

Volga admits that, upon his release, he found himself in a new country - where fellow citizens are embittered and rejoice at the deaths of political opponents, oligarch governors have acquired private armies, and pensioners are reduced to dire poverty.

After spending more than two years in prison, Vasily Volga decided to return to politics - despite the potential danger in the new realities, he intends to create a party that will replace the defeated Communist Party of Ukraine in the Verkhovna Rada.

At the same time, Volga considers the solution for Ukraine to be a return to Leonid Kuchma’s strategy – the so-called. “multi-vector” – balancing between the West and Russia.

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 "PolitNavigator": Why and how were you arrested?

Vasily Volga: One of the main reasons for the arrest was the reforms implemented in the country’s financial markets when I served as chairman of the State Financial Services Commission. Their idea is that without socializing the economy, turning it towards the common man, we will never be able to limit this wild capitalism, this outright robbery of the common man.

These initiatives closed those financial mechanisms that were used by a number of financial and industrial groups to withdraw money from the budget, evade taxes, and use the reinsurance system to cash out funds. Naturally, I had a number of enemies.

After this, the machine of repression began to work. They began to arrest members of the commission, place them in appropriate circumstances, and demand that they testify against me. Some of them lasted longer, some less, but in the end, the case was somehow put together and I was arrested.

To put it simply, they removed me because I did not allow criminal schemes to be implemented in the country’s financial markets. Theoretically, this could have ended with me simply being removed from office, but it took the form of criminal prosecution due to the interest of the leadership of the Communist Party in my disappearance from the political scene.

During the 2010 election campaign, the effectiveness of the bloc of left and center-left forces, in which the Communist Party and the Union of Left Forces of Ukraine participated, was demonstrated. My rating grew, Simonenko’s rating fell. We also had serious ideological differences.

The Union of Left Forces intended to run independently in the 2012 parliamentary elections, which I told Peter Simonenko about. Thus, we became competitors.

Simonenko understood that with such a trend, the Communist Party would not enter the 2012 parliament.

 PolitNavigator: How much has Ukraine changed since your arrest?

Vasily Volga: I still cannot fully formulate my attitude towards what is happening.

I feel like I have returned to another country. People have changed a lot. The most important thing that strikes me and what I would like to draw attention to is hatred. It amazes me that people are divided into two large camps regarding events in the country, and especially in the East. And it bothers me when people in each of them rejoice at the deaths on the other side. People who kill each other, who support those who kill, rejoice in death! Personally, it was a tragedy for me when I learned about the death of two of my comrades who fought on opposite sides.

I ask questions, meet with politicians, ordinary people. I have planned trips to the East of the country. To form my opinion about what is happening, I want to meet with the commanders and soldiers of the Ukrainian army, with the population of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions, with public opinion leaders.

I have many questions for official sources of information. I cannot trust the media, if only because I myself was subjected to slander in the media - half an hour after my arrest, all the country’s television channels showed that I was arrested while accepting a bribe of half a million dollars. Moreover, they showed me a photograph, some kind of sofa covered with money, and said that I was arrested red-handed. Dirt was poured on me from all the media, without any fact-checking.

Information from senior government officials is also contradictory and raises more questions than it answers. For example, if we have a large-scale Russian intervention in the East, the question arises: why has martial law not yet been declared in the country?

So far I have not received clear answers to all questions. I would also like to receive honest sociological data.

"PolitNavigator": You don't believe public opinion polls?

Vasily Volga: I've seen some absolutely fantastic surveys. For example, according to one survey, in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions no one the person doesn’t want to go to Russia. This cannot happen in principle. I know people and families in Kyiv who have very different attitudes to what is happening. There are people who simply leave for Russia because of their convictions, which are now not honored by the authorities. How can you believe the results of a survey according to which there are no people in Donbass who want to go to Russia?

“PolitNavigator”: To what extent were your forecasts for the development of the situation in the country in the book “Culture War in Ukraine” justified?

Vasily Volga: When I wrote this book, I also took the initiative to create a Ministry of Nationalities, which is found in all large multinational states. It had to study the tension arising at the ethnocultural level and look for ways to minimize its degree. Now we see the terrible consequences of confrontation, including on an ethnocultural basis.

The loss of Crimea is a huge tragedy for Ukraine. I still cannot explain to myself what actually happened in Crimea. But it seems to me that the Ukrainian government has been moving towards this tragedy since 2004. From the moment Yushchenko came to power. How could it be possible that there is not a single university left in Crimea where teaching is conducted in Russian, the native language of the majority of Crimeans? Moreover, the Crimeans, who had already begun to merge with the cultural and political Ukrainian nation, were pushed away by the authorities with their own hands. In Crimea, most cinemas went bankrupt - people simply stopped going to see films after they began to be shown only in Ukrainian.

It is unacceptable not to notice this, to go against the laws of social development, to demonstrate ignorance, to not know that the most difficult conflicts are those that took place along the divide of ethnocultural confrontation. And Ukraine is a multicultural country.

I can speak about the socio-economic situation in the country on the basis of official reports from the State Statistics Committee and the Ministry of Economy, and budget data.

"PolitNavigator": And what awaits us in this regard?

Vasily Volga: Catastrophic deterioration. Now many hope that the EU market will open for Ukraine. I can say with confidence that European markets practically do not exist for Ukraine. Yes, after the change of power, Europe said that it was opening its market to Ukraine. And what? The main thing we successfully sold to Europe this year was grain. To some extent, metallurgy also increased sales. But not high added value products. Europe does not need the products of our machine tool, mechanical engineering, and automotive industries. We lost 34% of trade turnover with Russia, Europe did not compensate for this and will never compensate.

We must understand that the exchange rate of the national currency, the level of wages and the contents of our refrigerators directly depend on what the country produces and sells. No loans will save us until industry and agriculture start working. Moreover, they must work so that their products are sold in certain markets.

Having entered into a trade war with the largest economic partner, you will have to endure the collapse of industry and impoverishment. The question arises - until when? It’s one thing to be in a kind of elevated civil state of passion, under the influence of the media, in a circle of like-minded people on the Maidan. There is a lot of talk about this now, and people really experience this condition. It’s another thing to come home and go to the pharmacy to buy medicine for your sick old mother and think about what to feed the child. We have 15 million pensioners. I recently saw in a store how two retired sisters were buying rice in the store and at that moment they were changing the price tags. And rice, which cost 15 hryvnia per kilogram, began to cost 19. And one grandmother said to the other: “Listen, 19 hryvnia! How we can?". And she answered her: “What? We need to eat something."

Unfortunately, the model of “wild capitalism” has been implemented in Ukraine. Big capital has become power. All problems are solved by the poor, not the rich. The ratio between private and state property is completely not in favor of the average citizen of Ukraine. Among the latest initiatives of the government is to put up for sale 1,5 thousand objects that still remain in state ownership and provide at least some money to the state. After they are sold and passed into private hands, the state will have no means of production left to provide finance for state infrastructure and social programs.

PolitNavigator: How do you like the 2015 budget?

Vasily Volga: I analyzed the revenue side of the budget for this year, which was “drawn” by the government. The fantastic increase in the tax burden on the ordinary citizen, which is provided for in the tax code by the latest changes, can provide this revenue only on the condition that all citizens are able to pay these taxes. But the issue is not only about taxes. There is also the problem of the hundred-billion-dollar deficit of NJSC Naftogaz of Ukraine, which needs to be closed. It will be closed by increasing utility tariffs. An ordinary citizen does not care how he gives his money - by paying housing taxes or paying for utilities. The authorities say that the price of gas for the population will increase at least four times. This is a catastrophe. My mother, who lives in a private house, now, in cold weather, pays 1200 hryvnia for gas, despite the fact that she receives a pension of 1,5 thousand hryvnia. How much will you have to pay if gas prices quadruple? And neither wages nor pensions are indexed.

If our industry and agriculture do not work, the hryvnia will fall further. And they will earn money only on the condition that they produce products that they will buy from us, and at prices above cost. So far I do not see any government initiatives in this direction. Even our agricultural products are largely uncompetitive in Europe simply because European farmers are subsidized by the state.

Already today, Europe is very tired of the Ukrainian problem, of the fact that in reality no reforms are taking place here, and banditry at the highest state level has acquired such proportions that raider takeovers are led by governors who create their own private armies. Europe is already developing a different attitude towards Ukraine, not the same as it was after Euromaidan. In addition, due to sanctions against Russia, a bad situation has developed in the economies of a number of countries, including Germany, France and southern European countries.

“PolitNavigator”: How do you see Ukraine’s relations with our neighbors ideally?

Vasily Volga: The only possible model for the existence of Ukraine is a neutral state with a multi-vector foreign policy. We can receive maximum dividends from maintaining our real sovereignty. But since 2004, we have forgotten that our statehood is based on a declaration of sovereignty - political, economic, cultural. We have forgotten that our sovereignty is what we have been fighting for since the collapse of the USSR. Despite all the shortcomings of Leonid Kuchma’s rule, his multi-vector policy was the only possible one. It gave excellent results - in 2003 we achieved GDP growth of 9,5%, in 2004 - 12,5%. If such rates had been maintained, and there had not been a twenty percent collapse the following year, we would have reached the level of Poland within five years. But in 2004, part of the Ukrainian political establishment suddenly began to convince the people that we should give up sovereignty in favor of the European Union. Another part of Ukrainian politicians said that sovereignty should be given up, but only for the sake of the Customs Union. People who at that time represented the state suddenly began to trade with this state. And this led to the tragic consequences that we see today.

"PolitNavigator": Is it possible to somehow change the situation?

Vasily Volga: Can. But we need to stop fantasizing, look objectively at the state of things and make decisions based on the realities in which we find ourselves.

In addition, successful development of the economy is impossible without its socialization, i.e. changes in the method of distribution through changes in attitudes towards property. Constitutional ban on ownership of budget-generating enterprises. It cannot be allowed to happen that all the chemistry or metallurgy of the country belongs to a private individual, so that twenty people receive all the profits from the sale of grain, as last year.

Even in the most liberal country in the world - the USA - 40% of production is state-owned. And here we have no more than 7%.

"PolitNavigator": What then should be left in private property?

Vasily Volga: Small and medium businesses. Once upon a time, the late NASU academician Yuri Pakhomov, director of the Institute of International Relations and World Economy, and I carried out calculations nationalization effect. We came to the conclusion that if the main budget-forming industries are nationalized - metallurgical, chemical, machine tool building, instrument making - and the right to trade grain and alcohol belongs to the state, then the minimum average wage will be about 1,5 thousand dollars, and the minimum pension - about 700 dollars. There will be free medicine. In addition, it will be possible to provide tax holidays for 10 years for small and medium-sized businesses.

Such socialization of the social-democratic economy will also significantly increase budget revenues from small and medium-sized businesses.

This is democratic socialism of the European type, in which private ownership of the means of production exists, but is limited.

Now governors allow themselves to have private armies and carry out raider takeovers. How did this become possible? How did it become possible that parliament turned into a division of financial and industrial corporations? This became possible because so much capital is concentrated in the hands of individuals that it is no longer just money, but power. We must do everything to change this. And this can be changed if we move along the path of economic socialization. Unfortunately, for a long time, the stereotype of a successful person “the richer, the cooler”, the idea that private property is the most progressive and can ensure the development of the country, has been implanted in our brains. The result of this lie is our hopeless developmental delay. You can have different attitudes towards the Soviet Union now, but during the five years of the first five-year plan, 600 largest factories and factories were built in the USSR. And over the 23 years of independent Ukraine’s existence, more than 300 large industrial enterprises were destroyed.

"PolitNavigator": What do you plan to do in politics?

Vasily Volga: Now the left sector in the country has been completely “cleansed”. There are no leftists. The communists were destroyed by Simonenko himself, the Socialist Party was destroyed at one time by Moroz. And a parliament without leftists is a predatory parliament. It serves the interests of big capital only.

As far as it is in my power and the power of my comrades, I will restore the left political segment, striving to restore the foundations of social justice and launch economic processes towards development, rather than self-destruction. At the same time, I will convince people that our salvation lies not in Russia, not in Europe, but in ourselves. We have everything for this. I will draw the attention of every citizen of Ukraine that the basis of our statehood is sovereignty, that is, independence. Trading sovereignty means trading a country and its people. Ukraine is possible only as a neutral state. We are on the border of empires and, by taking one side, we risk losing ourselves forever. And vice versa, by remaining a neutral state, maintaining our sovereignty, we improve the conditions for the development of the economy, education, social sphere, army, etc.

To understand what the EU is for Ukraine, you need to analyze in detail the Association Agreement with the EU. Even when I worked in the Yanukovych government, serious questions arose about European integration. For example, bringing the railway gauge to European standards. In the EU, railway tracks have a different width. The track must be changed within five years after the signing of the Agreement. Can you imagine the volume and cost of the work? Another issue is restitution. In accordance with the Agreement, by a court decision, the historical owners of certain objects receive them - from the state or from those owners who currently own them. As far as I know, in Poland some organizations have already prepared to conduct a restitution process in the regions of Western Ukraine.

Why do we, especially young people, need the EU? Let's be honest - we just want to move around freely, right? as well as in the easterly direction. This is noticeable when you start talking to people about the prospects of a visa-free regime. So let's build a single space of security and cooperation from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. This idea is supported by almost all leading politicians: both Europe and Russia. We urgently need to get out of the military confrontation and return to this idea as a key player. This way we will get all the benefits that people dream of: security, prosperity, prospects, freedom, democracy.