Poroshenko will not last long with such associates
Artem Buzila, journalist, Odessa
The Odessa Regional Council has a new head since yesterday - 34-year-old Alexey Goncharenko. This “young and promising” figure quickly learned political omnivorousness from his pot-bellied senior comrades from the Verkhovna Rada. Now guided by Petro Poroshenko, in the recent past he was a long-term speaker of the local Party of Regions. A traitor in the “blue and white” camp, who never became part of the “orange” camp. But Poroshenko seems to have no others on the bench.
...Several weeks ago there were rumors that Goncharenko would even receive the post of governor, but the Poroshenko administration nevertheless decided that Kolomoisky’s protege Igor Palitsa was coping with this position so far.
And for good reason. Palitsa, for all my critical attitude towards him, still turned out to be a fairly adequate person, and after the tragedy of May 2, he managed to calm down the situation in the city with grief. At least the local elections on May 31, during which the conditional “anti-Maidan” candidate Gennady Trukhanov won, were held in a calm atmosphere and without any subsequent revolutions. In addition, it was Palitsa who was one of the first in the country who dared to use force against the unbridled Euromaidan protesters, first near the Russian consulate, then near the Ibiza nightclub, at least partially embodying the slogan “one law for all.”
Goncharenko is different. The newly appointed head of the regional council will make up for the lack of consistency in his views and his own life ideology with radicalism and odiousness.
I remember Goncharenko from 2009, when as a young man he took his first steps in political activity. Despite the fact that at first the then deputy of the city council gave the impression of a real fighter for justice, upon closer examination he turns out to be nothing more than an omnivorous upstart.
He was a radical against the ex-mayor of Gurvits, then switched to his own father Kostusev, who became the main competitor in the fight for the position of mayor. The next enemy of all times and peoples was Igor Markov, to whom Goncharenko ingloriously lost the parliamentary elections in the fall of 2012 (later, with the help of Goncharenko, Markov’s well-deserved mandate would be taken away from him). Finally, after the fall of Yanukovych, Goncharenko has new enemies: “separatists”, Putin, Crimean Prime Minister Aksyonov.
The first time this is perceived with enthusiasm, then you stop believing in the sincerity of this person.
And if earlier Goncharenko was engaged in a harmless struggle for parking, today he is already photographed with a grin against the backdrop of burnt corpses in the House of Trade Unions, and tomorrow he will initiate mass arrests of all those who disagree.
Another thing is that Goncharenko will not be able to become a local Kolomoisky. Goncharenko’s authority among Euromaidan is zero, the “Regional” trail makes itself felt, for Anti-Maidan he is a traitor and enemy number one, and for moderate Odessa residents, the radicalism of the new head of the regional council will clearly not add a calm life.
As a result, nothing but an absolutely unnecessary rocking of the situation with Goncharenko’s arrival in Odessa will happen for either side. But the confrontation between Kolomoisky and Poroshenko will receive its logical continuation in Southern Palmyra. So far, however, Goncharenko looks like too weak an argument to carry out the will of his patron. Leading the regional council of the largest region of the country is not petty mischief with the Ukrainian flag on the Crimean peninsula.
And the example of Goncharenko, by the way, clearly shows that Poroshenko has no plan to “live in a new way,” just as there are no worthy new personnel. Don’t consider Goncharenko’s “carcass” as such! Yes, and this is a dubious step in the conditions of Odessa. If Goncharenko escaped from Yanukovych’s ship at the right moment, where are the guarantees that this story will not repeat itself?
We shouldn’t be surprised if we soon see Alexey again with the St. George’s ribbon, or even with the Russian tricolor.
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