Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatseniuk has announced that the customs service will undergo a staff reshuffle due to numerous complaints.
“After today’s meeting we’ll adopt the corresponding decision on the leadership of Ukrainian customs,” Yatseniuk said at an extended meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers with the participation of the heads of regional administrations on Wednesday.
Odesa Governor Mikheil Saakashvili raised the question about the customs at the meeting.
According to him, after the project to repair the Odesa-Reni road had been announced, customs leaders made a number of decisions on cutting the income from customs in Odesa region. In particular, energy customs was excluded from Odesa and the plan on customs’ levy was exceeded by 20%.
According to Saakashvili, this was done deliberately and caused cargo to be processed in other regions instead of Odesa.
Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko said that the law that would fund the road’s construction by increasing inflow from the work of Odesa region’s customs hadn’t come into force yet, and that all the customs office had received was increased levy plans.
She said she was ready to discuss the issues affecting Odesa customs with Saakashvili.
After that, Yatseniuk asked the governors present if they were satisfied with the work of customs in their regions. No one was.
