During her speech at the roundtable “Election campaigns abroad: international practice and recommendations for Ukraine,” Viktoriya Siumar, a member of parliament from the European Solidarity faction, spoke about alarming trends among the intentions of people who left the country during the full-scale invasion. In particular, Siumar referred to the results of a sociological survey conducted in Germany, Poland, and the Czech Republic. “How is the country working with Ukrainians who were forced to leave because of the war today, and how is it going to return them? Do they plan to return to Ukraine? This was the main question we wanted to hear the answer to, and what is key to returning,” Siumar explains.
“Most of all, at that time, it was a more or less normal winter from 2023 to 2024, but problems with critical infrastructure were named as a problem for the return of 34% of Ukrainians. Similarly, 34% named security. That is, the situation with critical infrastructure after not the most difficult winter was the most critical. Now this challenge is growing rapidly, and it may be key to losing a large part of the people again,” warns Siumar.
“Then there was the housing issue, people have nowhere to return, this is 26%, the completion of the full-scale invasion for another 26%, and the opportunity to find a job is -16%. If we take it in millions, 3-4 million people want to stay where they went,” the deputy states.
She also noted that a third of Ukrainians abroad were already not interested in events in Ukraine then, and 13% received information from Ukrainian sources. “From Ukrainians abroad – another 29%. And only 14% from abroad. That is, Ukraine could not establish information work with those Ukrainians who are abroad,” Siumar states.
According to her, the biggest challenge is the choice of state bodies to work with Ukrainians abroad, of the Russian messenger Telegram: “We choose Telegram to work with Ukrainians, thereby putting them on a Russian messenger with a complete lack of regulation. And this is done by Ukrainian embassies, among others. In my opinion, this is a strategic mistake.”
“It is a great pity that the Ministry of Unity died before it was born. This is a necessary job that someone should take on. Because the Ukrainian community is one of the world’s largest communities today, which is forced to live abroad. And how we build an attitude towards these people and work with them depends not only on who they vote for, but also on what Ukraine will be like in the future,” says Siumar.
She also criticized the politicization of the diplomatic service, which does not contribute to the adequate work of political parties with Ukrainians abroad. “My colleagues have repeatedly encountered that, when they come to any country, they strive to meet with representatives of Ukrainian public organizations. These people, of course, immediately said “embassy”. The embassy did everything to deny them access to the premises for meetings. Even if it is not the embassy hall, but simply some communities that this embassy takes care of. This is an absolutely abnormal situation of politicization, which does not allow us to work adequately with Ukrainians. Because in fact, this is what people abroad need – to talk. They often say when you will arrive and the prospects for ending the war. They really want to get this information firsthand. And the embassy should be interested in representatives of various parliamentary and non-parliamentary political parties working with Ukrainians abroad. There is no such interest; on the contrary, there are direct obstacles,” the MP noted.
“You know how many obstacles were created for us to be able to attend any international events at all. Only now has this problem somehow begun to be resolved, after the Resolution of the European Parliament, which is a great shame for the country. Because the European Parliament points out fundamental problems with the rights of the opposition, Viktoriya Siumar reminded us in general.
“We are not only incorrectly building information work with Ukrainians abroad, but also miscommunicating this topic within the country. Because the accusations that Ukrainians abroad should be deprived of a voice, which are heard from time to time in the country, are crossing out the future of Ukraine as a European, democratic, and even Ukrainian country. This rhetoric must be stopped. The task of the state is to return Ukrainians to Ukraine as much as possible, and not to create conditions for them in which they say, “Well, no one is waiting for us there”. In fact, they are waiting. And creating formats of division is the worst thing we can do for our own future,” Victoria Syumar summed up.