Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk's ambitious reform program to attack corruption and stifling Soviet-era bureaucracy won quick approval in parliament on Dec. 11, with 269 members of parliament -- meaning dozens of votes to spare -- endorsing the action plan soon after he spoke.
The clear majority came from the Bloc
of Petro Petro Poroshenko with 123 votes, Yatsenyuk’s People’s Front with 77 votes, Samopomich with 27 votes, Oleh Lyashko’s Radical Party with 20 and Batkivshchyna with 15.
The Opposition Bloc, composed of many former ruling Party of Regions members tied to the ousted President Viktor Yanukovych, did not support the program and plans to offer an alternative one. Altogether, only 28 lawmakers voted against Yutsenyuk’s suggestions.
Presenting
the program of his government for 2015, Yatsenyuk said that the main
task for the country next year will be to survive Russian military
aggression and a deep economic crisis.
Yatsenuyk
said that Ukraine’s public debt more than doubled between 2010
and 2014, from $30 billion to $70 billion. This
year, the nation’s gross domestic product dropped by 7 percent, and
industry output decreased by 10 percent.
“As
the country was robbed and plundered, as we are in a state of Russian
military aggression, it will be very difficult to go out of this
crisis by our own,” Yatsenyuk said. “Without the help of our
international partners it will be almost impossible to do,” he
added.
In
2014 Ukraine has received $9 billion of financial bailout from the
International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and other international
institutions. But in 2015 it will need at least another $15 billion
of help despite current IMF program. To prevent the default, Ukraine
will need the international conference of donors and the recovery
plan for Ukraine.
“Nobody
will simply give us the bailout,” Yatsenyuk addressed the
lawmakers. “To get the help we will need to conduct tough reforms
you were talking about during elections. Now it’s time to press the
buttons for these reforms.”
The
prime minister said reforms that have not been done in 23 years of
Ukraine’s independence now will have to be done in 23 months.
Therefore he did not promise easy changes to anybody.
Yatsenyuk
said that the non-bloc status of Ukraine should be cancelled.
The
Agency of military and industrial complex should be created within
the government.
In
four years term Ukraine should build a borderline with Russia. The
project is called European Wall. Parts of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts
that are now under control of Kremlin-backed separatisms and Russian
military should be inside the wall, Yatsenyuk hopes. Ukraine has
already received Hr 235 million from the European Union to secure its eastern border but will need more in the future.
Yatsenyuk
said Ukraine will protect its interests in international courts.
According to him, Russia is obliges to pay Ukraine over a trillion
dollar of compensation for losses caused by annexation of Crimea.
Ukraine will sue Russia in the United Nations international court for
violating international convention on fighting terrorism.
In
terms of information policy and fighting information war with Russia,
Ukrainian media in English and other languages should be created.
Another
task for Ukrainian authorities will be deregulation. Certain progress
in this field has already been done. This year number of inspection
bodies was decreased from 56 to 28. And the number of their control
functions went down from 1063 to 600.
Another
step will be to cancel Oblast State Administrations, main
governmental bodies on the level of oblasts. Their functions will be
transferred to local councils. Thanks to this decentralization, the
regions will have more opportunities for self-governance.
Yatsenyuk
said that electronic governance should replace tons of papers that
circulate in cabinets all over the country for months and even years.
Special
mention was to the law on lustration and anticorruption legislation
that were adopted this year. They should start working next year. In
this respect the National Anticorruption Bureau should be created as
soon as possible. It will be responsible for investigating corruption
cases among high level officials and bring them to justice. While
another governmental body, the National Agency for Prevention of
Corruption will be focused on monitoring the life style of the
officials with their incomes as their declarations and information on
their property will become available to the public.
Yatsenyuk
said that public procurements should also become electronic.
Number
of taxes should be decreased from 22 to 9.
Certain
measures need to be done in order to bring the economy out of shadow.
In this respect Yatsenyuk offered to decrease single social tax from
41 percent to 15 percent. In Yatsenyul’s opinion it will make
employers interested in paying salaries officially, not in envelopes.
To ban inspections of small and medium business for two-three years
will also help their development.
While
Russia is closing its market for Ukrainian goods in 2014, Ukraine’s
export to the European Union countries increased by over 12 percent
this year and continues growing. Despite this, his government has
already started negotiations on free trade zones with Canada and
Turkey. He believes such zones should be also created with Isreal,
Gulf countries and Western Africa.
The
only way to eliminate corruption in the state owned companies is to
privatize them or to hire highly qualified foreign managers.
At
the moment, in Ukraine there are around 1,500 enterprises that cannot
be privatized. Yatsenyuk suggests selling over 1,200 of them to
private investors and to find foreign managers for other two hundred
objects that are really strategic and should remain in state
ownership. Those strategic enterprises should be also under permanent
control of so-called “Big Four” international auditing companies.
The
prime minister said that the deficit of Naftogaz, the state-owned oil
and gas company, is bigger than Ukraine’s public debt. In his
opinion this company should be reorganized in three different
companies. Ukraine’s gas transportation system should remain in
state ownership but 49 percent of it should be managed by
international operators.
Yatsenyuk’s
government also plans to increase tariffs for gas and other energy
resources. While there will be a system of direct address subsidies
for citizens who really need them.
The
only branch of the economy that demonstrated growth in 2014 was
agribusiness. This sector grew by 16 percent.
“Ukraine
should take the lead in global food markets,” Yatsenyuk said.
“Someone has oil, someone has gas, but we something without which
it is not possible to live – food.”
However,
he said that sell of agricultural land will be suspended as lawmakers
are not ready to discuss it.
Yatsenyuk
announced new Labor Code that should be adopted in 2015 as well a law
on national police. Medical insurance needs to be introduces
gradually.
The
next year Yatsenyuk’s government will have to pay hundreds of millions in hryvnia of social payments to the citizens that were temporally moved
from annexed Crimea, and occupied parts of Donetsk and Luhansk
oblasts. At the moment there are more than 600,000 officially
registered such people. Talking about citizens on the occupied
territories Yatsenyuk addressed Russian president Vladimir Putin.
“Mr. Putin, you make citizens of Donbas hostages,” Yatsenyuk said.
“Follow the Minsk (peace) protocol, take out your bandits, stop supplying
weapons and Ukraine will resume control on its territory and pay all
social payments.”
Yatsentuk
said that the next year will be difficult for all social groups.
“In
2015 we have to survive in order that 2016 will become a year of
Ukraine’s economic stability,” he said.
Kyiv
Post staff writer Oksana Lyachynska can be reached at
[email protected].
