KIEV, February 06. /ITAR-TASS/. The chairman of the political council of Ukraine’s opposition Batkivshchina (Fatherland) Party, Arseny Yatsenyuk, voiced on Thursday constitutional amendment proposals that would significantly narrow the presidential power.
In particular, the opposition insisted on vesting the parliament with the right to appoint and dismiss the government, appoint the prosecutor general and the head of the Ukrainian Security Service, he told reporters on the sidelines of a parliamentary session.
Besides, the opposition believed local government administrations must be abolished to be replaced with local executive committees, he said.
Under the opposition plans, the president was losing his right to terminate the operation of acts approved by the Cabinet of Ministers. He also mentioned the draft document as changing the process to form the Constitutional Court - half of its members must be elected by a judiciary convention and another half - by parliamentarians.
“Our offer is to have a vote on constitutional amendments next Tuesday, on February 11,” Yatsenyuk said. “If the Party of Regions has its offers, we are ready to look into them,” he added, accusing Party of Regions’ deputies of an attempt to stall the amendment issue.
He said the ruling party had “no vision of a constitutional reform”. In reply to a query about how things would develop if the opposition proposals found no support with the majority in the parliament, Yatsenyuk said “the whole responsibility for an escalation of tension will be with the ruling party”.