Ukraine - Forward!
Natalija Korolewska's party “Ukraine - Forward!” ( Ukrainian Партію Наталії Королевської “Україна - Вперед!” ; Russian Украина - Вперёд! ) Is a social democratic political party in Ukraine . It was founded in 1998 as the Ukrainian Social Democratic Party (USDP) and was renamed in 2012 after its expulsion from the blok Juliji Tymoshenko after its new chairwoman Natalija Korolewska .
history
The USDP was formed in 1998 as a spin-off from the United Social Democratic Party of Ukraine (SDPU). Thirteen regional organizations of the SDPU left the party at this time due to a privatization debate and formed the USDP. The politician Vasily Onopenko became the first chairman. In the same year, the USDP took over the Ministry of Justice in the Ukrainian government.
In 2001 the party joined the Yulia Tymoshenko bloc under the leadership of the politician of the same name. In 2006, Jewhen Kornijtschuk took over the chairmanship, who previously headed the USDP Kiev and is Deputy Minister of Justice.
In December 2011, Natalija Korolewska was elected chairman of the USDP. She named the party in Україна вперед! around. Shortly afterwards, the party was expelled from the Yulia Tymoshenko bloc for alleged cooperation with President Yanukovych's government . The party ran an intense campaign for the 2012 parliamentary elections. In addition to Korolewska, the former Ukrainian soccer player Andrij Shevchenko was the top candidate. Ukraine called itself - Forward! as an opposition party with a European and social democratic vision and expressly ruled out any possible cooperation with the ruling Party of the Regions after the elections, but critics nevertheless accused the party that its election campaign was a deception by the Yanukovych government in order to draw votes from the actual opposition parties . Since the party received only 1.6% of the vote in the elections, entry into the Verkhovna Rada was clearly missed.
Political orientation and importance
The party sees itself in the tradition of social democracy and, after presenting itself, saw itself as its only legitimate representative in Ukraine. There are other parties making this claim, but they are also no longer represented in the Ukrainian Parliament: the SDPU, which has shrunk to a dwarf party, from which the USDP emerged, the Socialist Party of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Labor Party (united with the Party of Regions 2012).
Great personalities
- Yevhen Kornijchuk , temporarily chairman of the USDP, deputy minister of justice
- Olena Schustik , Vice Chairwoman of the USDP
- Natalija Korolewska , Chairperson of Ukraine - Forward !, former Minister of Social Affairs
Web links
- Ukraine website - Forward!
- Gerhard Lechner: With Natalja against Julia ; Article from the Wiener Zeitung , August 3, 2012