"Here Is Better"

Son vs. father in Chicago

Michael Polovchak, a bus driver in Sambur, a Soviet town in the western Ukraine, had wanted to join his relatives in the U.S. so much, and for so long, that he petitioned Moscow 18 times for permission to emigrate. Finally last December approval came, and Polovchak, 42, brought his wife Anna and their three children to Chicago. He worked as a factory janitor, she as a cleaner in a hospital. But neither formed close ties with the Windy City's large community of Ukrainians, many of whom were World War II refugees, and Michael soon began to complain: Chicago was too noisy, the air polluted, the weather bad, the food contaminated by chemicals. Eventually he began to talk of going back home.

Michael's eldest son Walter, a freckle-faced boy of twelve, was happy in his new life. He and his sister Natalie, 17, became concerned that they might be returned to the Ukraine. On July 14, they took refuge at a cousin's house. "I want to stay here," he later explained through an interpreter in juvenile court. "I have new friends, a nice school, a bicycle I fixed myself. Here is better than my country. I would rather never see my parents than leave Chicago." With that, a seemingly routine runaway case became an international issue. With rare speed, the Immigration and Naturalization Service approved young Walter's petition for "political asylum," a claim made possible by a recent change in the immigration laws that allows "a person," no age specified, to seek such refuge; before, a parent or guardian had to sign a request for asylum by a minor.

The Soviet embassy in Washington warned of "far-reaching consequences" if the "kidnaping" of the boy was allowed to proceed. Walter's father, who speaks almost no English, asked: "Am I a drunkard? Do I starve my children? Have I broken any laws? I have not. So who is the Government to take my child?" In defense of young Walter, an aunt, Anastasia Junko of Santa Barbara, Calif., declared that even in the Ukraine the children had never been close to their father, whom friends of the family describe as a strict disciplinarian. Daughter Natalie, who also insists on staying in the U.S., feared that if her brother is "forced to go back, he will be punished. He can have no good education or job and will be followed for the rest of his life for speaking out against the Soviet Union."

"Political asylum allows Walter to stay," says INS Spokesman Verne Jervis. "That's all it does. It does not require him to stay or deal with the issue of custody." Chicago Juvenile Court Judge Joseph Mooney scheduled a hearing this week to determine whether Walter will be placed in the custody of one of his two U.S. aunts or be returned to his father. Although U.S. custody law has traditionally sought to avoid splitting up families under almost any circumstances, Walter's attorney will argue that his future would be seriously jeopardized by being forced to return to the Soviet Union. In Chicago, most observers regret the confrontation between parent and child, family and state. As Kathy Bereza, a member of Chicago's Ukrainian Baptist Church, said: "We have sympathy for both sides. It is a tragedy. If only Michael Polovchak had given himself more of a chance to find out about life here."

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