Ukraine’s PM quarrels with deputies accusing them of lies and unlimited populism

World July 04, 2014, 21:28

He blamed parliament for adopting legislative initiatives to please the voters instead of passing government-proposed bills, which could guarantee more cash flows from the West

KIEV, July 04. /ITAR-TASS/. Ukraine’s parliament-appointed Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk clashed with deputies on Friday, accusing them of populism and lies.

Yatsenyuk’s speech was stormy. He blamed parliament for adopting legislative initiatives to please the voters instead of passing government-proposed bills, which could guarantee more cash flows from the West.

“The government is not going to yield to blackmail,” Yatsenyuk said pledging to reformat parliament if deputies refused to support the cabinet of ministers’ initiatives.

Over the past few months, the deputies have voted for just one basic government-proposed bill, which served as ground for the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to issue the first tranche to Ukraine.

“It is necessary to pass other laws if we want to continue receiving (IMF) tranches. Unfortunately, the deputies refused to pass another twenty government-proposed bills,” Yatsenyuk stressed.

At the same time, he said, it is impossible to implement several parliament-adopted bills which are not supported by the state budget.

In the past four months, the deputies voted for bills requiring 11.5 billion hryvnias (about $1 billion) worth of expenses, which Ukraine does not have, before 2016. Another six Ukrainian bills that are now being signed into laws require another 34 billion hryvnias worth of budget spending before 2016.

“This is a show of unlimited populism and lies to people. We do not have this money,” the Ukrainian prime minister told the deputies.

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