Mykola Tomenko, Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, is convinced that the authorities failed to provide an appropriate level of publicity of the pension reform. M. Tomenko made this statement before the parliamentary hearings "The State of Pension Reform and Its Improvement."
According to the Deputy Chairman, external advertisements that suggested submitting the proposals via the Internet looked quite attractive as a promotional event, but not as an optimal tool of decision-making.
The Deputy Chairman announced that according to the figures from a recent opinion poll conducted by "The Ukrainian Democratic Circle" agency at the request of the Institute of Politics, most Ukrainians (88%) do not support raising of the retirement age for women from 55 to 60 years, and for men (state officials) up to 62. Only 6,8% of the citizens upheld raising of the retirement age. Furthermore, one third of Ukrainians (33,3%) believe that the protests against this initiative are possible in their place of residence, thus if there are some protests against the pension reform organized, nearly 36,8 million of Ukrainian will be ready to participate.
M. Tomenko is convinced that under such conditions the authorities shall revise their initiatives and change the terms of reform implementation.