Oleksandr Yemets

Yemets was a candidate in the 1990 Ukrainian Supreme Soviet election for central Kyiv, part of the anti-communist Democratic Bloc. At the time of his election, he was a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He was a member of the New Ukraine party and the Party of Democratic Revival of Ukraine.^[4] In the Verkhovna Rada (parliament of Ukraine), he was chair of the Human Rights Commission^[3] and deputy chairman of the Democratic Bloc's parliamentary group. He was re-elected in 1994, representing the city of Lviv's Halytskyi District (by which point he had left New Ukraine),^[5] and in 1998 on the proportional representative list of the People's Democratic Party. He left the People's Democratic Party in June 1999, joining the Reforms and Order Party.^[1]

Yemets was the first Minister of Nationalities and Migration [uk], serving from 26 April 1993 to 1 July 1994.^[6] From 26 March to 14 August 1996, he was also deputy prime minister for political and legal affairs.^[7] In 1992, he was briefly a member of the State Duma of Ukraine [uk] with a portfolio of legal matters. From 1992 to 1998, he was an adviser to presidents Leonid Kravchuk and Leonid Kuchma on drafting the Constitution of Ukraine. He was a founding member of the People's Democratic Party and a member of its executive council.^[3]

Yemets was a member of the board of Galician Investments ZAT IK from 1995 to 1998, alongside Andriy Sadovyi. Sadovyi would later become mayor of Lviv.^[7]

On the evening of 28 January 2001, Yemets was travelling towards Kryvyi Rih in his brother's Mercedes-Benz 280E on Highway N-23 [uk] at a speed of 260 km/h (160 mph).^[8] At 20:30, while six kilometres from the village of Marianske in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, the car slid off the highway and into a ditch, colliding with a tree. Yemets's arms, legs and hips were fractured, and he suffered a traumatic brain injury. Following the crash, the car's driver, Ruslan Zaichenko, took Yemets to the nearby city of Apostolove, where he was treated at a local hospital. Yemets died that evening.^[9] Zaichenko was not seriously injured during the crash. Investigators from the State Automobile Inspectorate [uk] concluded after one day that Yemets' death had been accidental.^[8]

After his death, Yemets was buried at Baikove Cemetery. He had one son, Leonid, who later became a politician in his own right.^[7]