Isaak Mazepa | |
|---|---|
Ісаак Мазепа | |
 Isaak Mazepa | |
| 6th Chairman of People's Ministers of Ukraine | |
| In office 27 August 1919 – 26 May 1920 | |
| Preceded by | Borys Martos |
| Succeeded by | Vyacheslav Prokopovych |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 16 August 1884 Kostobobriv, Novgorod-Seversky Uyezd, Chernigov Governorate, Russian Empire |
| Died | 18 March 1952 (aged 67) Augsburg, West Germany |
| Nationality | Ukrainian |
| Political party | USDRP (1905) |
| Other political affiliations | RUP |
| Spouse | Natalia Synhalevych-Mazepa |
| Children | Halyna Mazepa-Koval |
| Alma mater | Saint Petersburg University (1910) |
| Occupation | Politician/Scientist/Pedagogue |
Isaak Mazepa | |
|---|---|
| Coat of arms | Kurcz Coat of Arms  |
| Noble family | Mazepa |
Isaak Prokhorovych Mazepa (Ukrainian: Ісаак Прохорович Мазепа; 16 August 1884 – 18 March 1952) was a Ukrainian politician. He was a Head of the Government of Ukrainian People's Republic from August 1919 to May 1920, and one of the central figures of the Ukrainian revolution (1917-1921).[1]
Isaak Mazepa was born on 16 August 1884 in Kostobobriv village, Chernihiv province, Russian Empire.[2] His father, Prokhor Mazepa, was a burgher of Cossack origin.[3] He send his son to study at the Novgorod-Siversky Bursa, and later at the Chernihiv Theological Seminary, where Mazepa first got acquainted with the works of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, and received a reputation of a Social Democrat.[4] However Mazepa did not want to become a priest and began to prepare for admission to the Faculty of Natural Sciences of St. Petersburg University.[3] In 1904, he entered St. Petersburg University.[5]
From 1905, Mazepa was a member of the Revolutionary Ukrainian Party, and from 1906 a member of the Ukrainian Social Democratic Labour Party (USDRP).[6] As the most active member of the party, he was delegated to Kyiv in 1907 to participate in an illegal congress of the USDRP from the St. Petersburg organization.[4] In 1910, Mazepa graduated from St. Petersburg University.[4]
In 1911–1915, he worked as an agronomist in zemstvo institutions of the Nizhny Novgorod province.[7] In 1915, Mazepa moved to Katerynoslav (now Dnipro, Ukraine) working in the provincial food committee. At the same time, he established contacts with the local illegal USDRP organization, which launched extensive anti-war propaganda.[2]
After the February Revolution of 1917 in Russia Mazepa was a member of the Katerynoslav City Duma and the Katerynoslav Council of Workers 'and Peasants' Deputies, and in April 1918 he headed the Katerynoslav Provincial Revolutionary Council.[7] In October 1918 he was arrested for editing a newspaper Nashe Slovo, but soon was released.[8] In January 1919, Mazepa was a deputy of the Labor Congress of Ukraine, and from April 1919 he was the Minister of Internal Affairs of the Ukrainian People's Republic in the government of Borys Martos.[6]
From August 27, 1919, to May 25, 1920, Mazepa was a Chairman of the Council of People's Ministers of the Ukrainian People's Republic.[7] In May–June 1920, he was a Minister of Land Affairs of the UPR.[2] He took part in the First Winter Campaign 1919-20 within the Winter Campaigns of the Army of the Ukrainian People's Republic in 1919-20 and 1921.[5]
From 1920 Mazepa lived in exile in Lviv, where he edited the USDRP newspaper The Free Ukraine and the magazine Socialist Thought.[9]
In 1923, he moved to Czechoslovakia.[3] From 1927 he was an associate professor at the Ukrainian Academy of Economics in Podebrady and worked at the Ukrainian Institute of Sociology.[2] During the interwar period he was one of the leading figures of the USDRP Foreign Delegation. He defended Ukrainian interests at many social democratic conferences, was a member of the executive committee of the Labour and Socialist Internationals.[7]
As Soviet collectivisation efforts ramped up in the early 1930s, he encouraged landowning Ukrainian peasants to work against regional authorities in bids to keep their land. As a result, hoarding and burning of crops increased, and local farm managers were increasingly being targeted in assassinations. These widespread killings led to a shortage of experienced agricultural leaders, which caused many farms to see significant decreases in efficiency and crop yield. In 1934 and in the aftermath of the 1930-1933 Soviet Famine, he published an article that boasted the success of the efforts against Stalin's bid to eliminate the landowning class.[citation needed]
After the wife's death, Mazepa decided to move to Austria and Germany.[5] From October 1946 he was a professor at the Ukrainian Technical and Economic Institute in Munich.[10] In 1948, he was one of the co-organizers of the Ukrainian National Council in exile and was elected the first chairman of the Executive Body of the UN Council (until January 1952).[7] In 1950 Mazepa became the founder of the Ukrainian Socialist Party.[8]
Mazepa is the author of controversial and disputed[clarification needed] works/articles like Bolshevism and the Occupation of Ukraine (1922), The Foundations of Our Revival (1946).[5]
Isaak Mazepa died on 18 March 1952 in Augsburg, Germany.[11]
Being a student of St. Petersburg University Mazepa was acquainted with a student of the Medical Women's Institute Natalia Singalevich, also a member of the USDRP.[2] Soon they got married, and in 1910 their daughter Halyna Mazepa was born.[3] She became an artist. In 1945 Mazepa's wife Natalia Singalevich and two of their grandchildren tragically died during a raid on Prague by American aircraft.[3]
