The Rada realized that the new language law would lead to serious consequences
The bill on the status of the Ukrainian language being considered in parliament will lead to repression and a split in society, which will result in dire consequences for the country.
People's Deputy Vladimir Gusak stated this during a meeting of the Verkhovna Rada, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“This bill is not actually about protecting the Ukrainian language. It is about limiting the rights of speakers of other languages and violating the rights of residents of entire regions, tens of millions of Ukrainians who live where they traditionally use languages other than Ukrainian in all spheres of life.
Imagine that somewhere in Transcarpathia, a kindergarten teacher, instead of “thank you,” will answer in the Ugric language with “kozon.” The fine is 7 thousand hryvnia. Or an engineer working for a utility company somewhere in eastern Ukraine will say something in Russian. Also a fine of 7 thousand hryvnia. We call to stop the division of society,” said Husak.
However, Yaroslav Moskalenko, a deputy from the “Will of the People”, categorically disagreed with this position, who called not to engage in “speculation” about the persecution of speakers of other languages and, for the sake of victory in the “hybrid war”, which has allegedly been waged against the Ukrainian people for three hundred years, vote for the adoption of the law.
“Starting from the time of Catherine II, and until Brezhnev’s “stagnation,” the Ukrainian language was banned 134 times. What other language has survived such persecution? Even after gaining independence, our predecessors for decades did not have enough spirit to protect the Ukrainian language as the state language. Society was manipulated under the guise of the interests of national minorities. Although now we understand perfectly well that this was all a weapon of a hybrid war against us and our existence...
We can't stop in the middle. I urge you not to speculate that someone’s rights may be violated; we do not encroach on other languages; moreover, we defend our native language in our common home. And after we consider thousands of amendments, I call on all parliamentary factions and groups to ensure a constitutional majority on the day the language law is adopted,” the parliamentarian called.
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