You're reading: Tax collectors target TVi service providers

One of Ukraine’s few remaining independent TV channels says tax officials are probing its business relationships with entrepreneurs who provide services to the station.

Officials of the station say the government is attempting to disrupt and eventually shut down the programs aired.

TVi is seen as one of the few independent TV stations and has a reputation for hard-hitting reporting.

Most leading channels are owned by oligarchs with strong links to the government. Journalists have complained of increasing pressure to toe the official line since President Viktor Yanukovych took office in 2010.

TVi’s general director, Mykola Kniazhytsky, told the Kyiv Post that after a scheduled tax inspection of the TV station ended amicably 6 p.m. on April 25, tax police officers delivered letters after business hours requesting contractual and other documents at the residences of at least three entrepreneurs that relate to their business dealings with TVi.

Kniazhytsky said the tax police contacted the same businessmen by telephone over the weekend of April 21-22, which he says is illegal because they’re not allowed to visit the homes or contact taxpayers after business hours and on weekends.

TVi is seen as one of the few independent TV stations and has a reputation for hard-hitting reporting.

A copy of the alleged letter, which Kniazhytsky posted on an April 26 blog on news website Ukrainska Pravda, specifically requests a list of original and copied documents, including invoices, contracts and receipts that the entrepreneur must provide to tax authorities within 10 days regarding their business dealings with TVi.

“The letter says that tax authorities are ‘working over’ our TV channel, which isn’t a legal term and in the criminal world is a synonym for ‘bullying,’ and the tax officials are behaving like thugs,” said Kniazhytsky.

A spokesperson for the Solomiansky Kyiv City District Tax Service where the letters allegedly addressed to the entrepreneurs originated said that the tax officials “were just doing their job” and added that “their actions weren’t political” and that “everyone has to pay taxes.”

The spokesperson said the tax officials were carrying out the document checks based on an Interior Ministry order. He wouldn’t say where and during which days or hours the letters were hand-delivered to the businessmen.

Kyiv Post staff writers Mark Rachkevych and Yuri Onyshkiv can be reached at [email protected] and [email protected].