It may have been April Fool’s Day but the Communist Party, one of the three main political forces making up the current ruling coalition, were certainly not laughing. On that day Parliament decided against holding hearings on the prospects for Ukraine joining a customs union which already exists with Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia. Hearings would have just meant a general discussion in Parliament and little more. The Communists were not happy as their fellow coalition members from the Party of Regions, the biggest faction in Parliament, failed to give enough votes to support holding the hearings. And these votes were crucial.

Despite the successful efforts of parliamentary speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn to not give the opposition control of key committees, it is clear that the coalition is creaking. A meeting set for April 2 to coordinate the work of the coalition, which also consists of the Lytvyn Bloc and unaffiliated MPs, was cancelled. And this is not the first cancellation. The Communists recently complained about the lack of key posts given to them and soon saw one of their members of parliament appointed head of the Customs Service.  The key question is whether more cracks will appear before the Constitutional Court makes public its ruling on the legality of the coalition. No coalition can exist solely on the basis of political expediency and a quota of posts in Parliament or the executive branch. The Constitutional Court may well kill off this coalition but if it does not then action will have to be taken to paper over the cracks, otherwise the new authorities will not realize their oft-stated election promises of stability and prosperity.