“What happened today is something I already experienced in 2004 in Russia when my TV program was shut down and my residency permit taken away,” says Savik Shuster, a prominent political journalist. His déjà vu was followed by Ukrainian authorities’ decision to cancel his popular political TV show “Shuster Live” by stripping him off his right to work in the country.
The decision is seen as an indicator of shift in Ukraine’s freedom of speech– something the new government solely swore to uphold. It also comes shortly after the Panama Papers revealed offshore assets of the President Poroshenko and after Shuster hosted a four-hour open debate on the topic.
An outspoken proponent of free speech, Shuster has hosted several political talk shows in his career inviting to his studio numerous politicians, journalists as well as the general public to openly debate sometimes controversial issues.
When Shuster, who is also a former head of the Russian “Radio Liberty”, started his TV show “Freedom of Speech” in Russia it lasted only several years. It was following the advise of politician Boris Nemtsov, assassinated last year at Red Square, that Shuster moved to Ukraine. He brought his “Freedom of Speech” with him, hoping that after the Orange revolution the public needed a space for debates. And it did; the program was watched by many.
“I didn’t expect lies from Poroshenko. I seriously believed in his European democratic values. We all believed him…” says Shuster suggesting that the decision is politically motivated. “The power has turned back to Soviet-like conditions that can’t stand any critical thinking. We have to always say “yes” to it, we have to praise its “attempts” to lead us to Europe while it leads us to far Asia,” he says.
Considering that freedom of speech and European democratic values is something the President guaranteed when elected, and considering how many people died in recent years for those values, any threat to freedom of speech, or the government’s grip over the media, is indeed a double crime.
Shuster announced a hunger strike until his permit to work in Ukraine is granted back.
