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Joint players

The next European football championships will be hosted by Poland and Ukraine in 2012 and will be the first to be held in Eastern Europe. A Ukrainian perspective on the big event.

Following periods of conflict, Poland and Ukraine are once again cultivating friendly relations. Poland was the first state to recognise Ukraine following the latter's declaration of independence in 1991, and since the European Union began granting membership to states from Eastern Europe, Poland has acted as Ukraine's advocate with regard to European integration. It is therefore easy to see why the two countries applied to host the 2012 UEFA cup jointly, as it provides an opportunity for real partnership.

Photo: AP

In April 2007 Poland and Ukraine's application to host the EURO 2012 was approved, making this the first UEFA cup to be held in Eastern Europe.

A step towards Europe

Practically all Ukrainian politicians agree that for Ukraine, which is hoping to become a member of the EU, hosting the championships constitutes a major step in the direction of Europe. Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko emphasized that the EURO 2012 represented a unique opportunity for Ukraine to become integrated in Europe, and he called on all Ukrainian officials to consider their work in preparing for the European Championships as a contribution to integration in the EU. Evgeny Chervonenko, chairman of the Ukrainian national agency for the EURO 2012, is convinced that "the European championships will change Ukraine. Afterwards we will be a country with modern roads, airports and hotels. For this we need major investment.” According to a survey conducted by the Polish opinion research institute TNS Obop in April 2008, one third of Ukrainians expect the EURO 2012 to help boost the country's economic development.

A new infrastructure

In the six Ukrainian cities where the final round of the UEFA cup will be held – Kiev, Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk and Lviv as the main locations, and Odessa and Kharkiv as reserves – stadiums, airports, hotels, roads and other facilities must be brought up to European standards. It is estimated that this expansion of the infrastructure will cost 20 billion euros. Twenty percent of the costs are to be born by the Ukrainian state and 80 percent by Ukrainian and foreign private companies. More than one billion euros will go into modernising the airports, while around five billion will be spent on building new roads and a further billion on new railway networks.

Serious delays

But a year after Ukraine won its bid to hold the championships, the modernisation and expansion of the infrastructure is proceeding at a snail's pace. The railway network is in a terrible state – it can take as long as eight hours to travel 300 kilometres by train – and there has been little progress in the programme to build an additional 3,000 kilometres of motorways and expressways. One reason for the delay, in Poland as well as in Ukraine, involves internal political problems. In an official declaration issued in January 2008 UEFA stated: "It is obvious that in 2007 there was a certain degree of political instability in both countries. There is no question that the launch of investment-intensive projects like building stadiums, airports and motorways has suffered from this instability.” In Ukraine three bodies are now responsible for the European championships: a co-ordination committee headed by President Yushchenko, an organisation committee under Prime Minister Timoshenko and a national agency for the EURO 2012. To date they have scarcely managed to find a common language and each of them would like to exercise control over the allocation of funds. UEFA President Michel Platini therefore set Ukraine a preliminary deadline of summer 2008 to get moving with its infrastructure preparations

Who is investing where?

More progress has been made in building new stadiums than in modernising the infrastructure. Various European companies are involved in the preparations for the UEFA cup. The German construction company Hochtief is building a multi-functional stadium to accommodate 31,000 people in Dnipropetrovsk. Costing around 40 million euros, it is to be inaugurated in August 2008. The stadium in Lviv will be modernised by the Austrian company Alpine Holding to the tune of 85 million euros, and will hold 28,000 fans. The central stadium in Kiev, designed for 85,000 spectators, will be refurbished by a Taiwanese firm. Here, however, there have been serious breaches of security regulations. In front of the main entrance to the Kiev stadium a large shopping centre was built that blocked escape routes. It was not until the UEFA intervened that President Yushchenko ordered the half-finished building to be demolished again.

Hopes for Europe

Ukraine is hoping that staging the EURO 2012 successfully will bring it a step closer to Europe. Particularly in Western Europe Ukraine is still a blank spot on the map, but the arrival of millions of fans and a strong media presence are expected to change that. Ukraine would also like to forge closer relations to Poland. The joint organisation of one of the world's largest sporting events is a good way to start.

Yuri Silvestrov

Yuri Silvestrov was born in Ingulez, Ukraine, in 1960, and now lives in Kiev. A freelance journalist and interpreter, he served as press attaché at ...
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