Quite surprisingly, the protests in Ukraine which began after Yanukovich (the now ex-Ukrainian President) refused to sign a trade agreement with the European Union in favor of a trade deal with Russia, reached its peak when a statue of Lenin was smashed down in Kiev on December 8, 2013.
Until this crucial moment, monuments of Lenin had survived all political turbulences in the country, in Kiev and particularly in Southern and Eastern Ukraine. Often abandoned and ignored, they fell into pieces in small cities thanks to total indifference and neglect. In big industrial cities, monuments are often used as a place to take wedding pictures.
The destruction of a monument of Lenin in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, triggered the symbolic Leninfall” around the country.The statue’s destruction was widely filmed, captured and commented on online. Pieces of the statue were even set aside for sale online: Lenin’s palm was estimated at 1000 hryvnia (100 euro), a part of his hand: 750 hryvnia, while the breast and legs are sold by weight: 50 hryvnia per kilo. The vacant place was used for protestors’ creativity and became a site of political artwork: from the golden toilet as a symbol of state corruption, to the recent art project "golden youth of the country" in the reference to the students, who initiated the protests.
During the mass protests, the monuments of Lenin around Ukraine have been either toppled or damaged over the course of a few months which reached its peak after the bloody riots in February 2014 when no less than 90 monuments were smashed down in the whole country. There have already been several attempts to dismantle the monuments during the years of 2009-2013 guided by the Presidential Decree of Ukraine № 432/2009. However despite the fact that this decree authorized local authorities to dismantle Soviet monuments, there were still plenty of Ukrainian Lenins left. Small, big, painted gold, often abandoned, Ukraine still counted hundreds of them.
If Central and Eastern parts of Ukraine only started to get rid of their Lenins during the protests, Western Ukraine went a step further by removing other Soviet monuments, such as monuments to Unknown Soldiers or other Soviet figures, such as Kirov, Karl Marx or Dzerzhinsky. Why have we waited 25 years to remove the Lenins? Everything was triggered by the ex-Ukrainian president Yanukovych, when he refused to sign an agreement with the EU and suddenly turned towards a union with Russia. For many, Putin's Russia is the revival of the Soviet Union with the rehabilitation of Stalin as "a good manager", a threat which still exists next door.
All over the world attacking statues is a symbolic political gesture. Smashing Lenin has a strong symbolic gesture; it is to break with a corrupted government and with the Soviet past. Toppling Lenin is not about the Bolshevik leader at all. He is so symbolic of the Soviet Union, still and passive, standing in all of the smallest cities, he is just everywhere. Lenin, as the founder of the Soviet Union, stands as a symbol of authoritarianism, the old Soviet one and the new Russian one. It is also true that the angry crowds wanted to take revenge on their corrupted government and very often Lenin’s monument was the only monument to smash.
The communist party and some local activists still raise money to pay for other monuments or put to put old ones back, as in Mikolaiv. Sometimes, they station a round-the-clock vigil to protect a statue. However most probably the day will come when no one will care for them anymore and they will finish in some thematic park, as in Budapest. In Crimea, the underwater museum at Cape Tarkhankut was created and housands of busts of former Communist leaders found their shelter, including Lenin, Stalin and Marx. The toppling of the Lenin statue in Kiev released a lot of creative ideas as to how to replace the monument, as well as the popular cartoons about Lenin’s “adventures” in Kiev. The internet was overflowing with comical pictures where Lenin escapes the people’s revenge, seeking another place to stand. Other cartoons display Lenin and Stalin monuments complaining about their stay in Ukraine and asking for international asylum. Internet users exchanged ideas about a possible monument to replace the Lenin in Kiev. These propositions included lipstick, the Void, Yoda from Star Wars, etc.
So, 25 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, it seems that Ukrainians are finally ready to break with the Soviet past and Lenin, not as in 1991, where Ukraine became independent by default as the result of the collapse of the Soviet Union. Smashing Lenin was a strong symbolic gesture to say goodbye to the past, the long painful goodbye. “I was afraid”, said one of protesters, “that it will never happen. There’s nothing left of Lenin” he said “and thank God.”
Nataliya Borys, History, Ukraine
Photo1: Lenin hiding in the backyard - “Hey, comrade, have the Ukrainians left?” Source: Best Caricatures.
Photo2: Map of Lenin's statues toppled or removed, dated 23.02.2014
Source: Ukrainska Pravda.
Photo3: The broken monument in Vinnitsia. Source : www.vinnitsaok.com.ua.
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