Politexperts: bill #4128 could lead to the disintegration of Ukraine (VIDEO)
Political experts – director of the Foundation for Humanitarian Strategies Mikhail Pavliv, executive director of the Ukrainian Institute for Analysis and Management Policies Ruslan Bortnik and political analyst Kost Bondarenko – commented to the UOJ correspondent on the possible consequences of adoption by the Verkhovna Rada of bill #4128 "On Amendments to the Law of Ukraine «On Freedom of Conscience and Religious Organizations»" (as to changes in the subordination of religious communities).
Mikhail Pavlov expressed hope that bill #4128 will be failed by the Parliament, and all claims to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church will be stopped by the President. "With the things that are important for human identity, such as language, cultural identity – Kirilenko bill – the mechanism of a local civil conflict was launched in several regions of Ukraine. And such a marker thing like the Church and faith in a huge community, canonical Orthodox Ukraine, may trigger irreversible processes of the state decomposition. This is a prologue to the confessional wars we have seen, characterized by extreme savagery and brutality," the expert believes.
Ruslan Bortnik, in his turn, allows some chances of the bill adoption by the Parliament. "Why? Because there is no bread – bread this government doesn’t want to give people. It will provide circuses, that is, it will always create information conflict zones, which we will discuss with you, while they keep robbing," said the expert.
"This bill, if adopted, will certainly aggravate the social confrontation in Ukraine. There will be many places of potential social conflicts between neighbours, between people who have lived ages together as their ancestors did. This is the course for conflict; this is the course for division; this is the course for social disintegration, loss of the unity, which is still kept in Ukraine now. "
"Of course, this bill is targeted at only one denomination – the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, the largest in Ukraine today. It looks like a tasty piece of cake for many Ukrainian right-wing ideologues, due to which they are considering the possibility of increasing their influence on the minds of people, using religion," the expert said.
Kost Bondarenko believes that state intervention in the humanitarian sphere, which can be attributed to history, the language issue and the church, is unacceptable. "As soon as politicians begin to play on these delicate matters that lie outside government control, contradictions, disputes and hostility immediately arise. The manipulation of these categories is simply unacceptable - it is a political cheating. "
The political analysts also state that the adoption of the bill is inhumane. "Any church is not primarily a temple, but a union of people. It is first of all a community, and the community is people. And, accordingly, the adoption of a law that would infringe upon the rights of these people is doing irreparable harm to these people – not only moral but also material. This is a reason for dissatisfaction; this is an excuse for a series of new protests, especially considering the fact that the UOC counts millions of believers, if not tens of millions. So in this situation it is a very dangerous game that can play tricks on Ukraine".
