Mykola Tomenko: Authorities plan to legitimize Most Anti-Popular Reforms during the Last Week of Parliament´s Work
Talking about the actions of the opposition during the coming plenary week, Mykola Tomenko, Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, stated that the deputies from the opposition factions will be present during the scrutiny of the key drafts, including those positioned by the authorities as reformative ones.
The Deputy Chairman reminded that according to the schedule, the next week should become the last working week of the parliament before the session is adjourned. However, he stressed that "the last week of parliament´s work is the attempt to legitimize five anti-popular reforms declared by the power."
First of all, M.Tomenko mentioned the pension reform. He reminded that nearly 1000 amendments were submitted before the second reading. Another anti-popular reform is the healthcare reform. The Deputy Chairman informed that the parliament is to scrutinize the bills on the experimental healthcare reform in four regions, and on the general optimization, which, in fact, is a cut-down in the number of healthcare establishments.
"The third anti-popular reform is the land reform," M.Tomenko stressed. He informed that the Government submitted a package of bills on the land reform, although most citizens of Ukraine object to this reform according to the opinion polls.
"The fourth bloc of anti-popular reforms is the attempt to cut down the social benefits," M.Tomenko stated. It concerns the benefits for the participants of the Great Patriotic War, combatants of Afghanistan war, and other underprivileged groups of population.
Speaking about the fifth reform, the Deputy Chairman admitted that amendments to the tax reform could be regarded as the correction of mistakes of the anti-popular tax reform. It concerns the amendments suggested by the opposition during adoption of the Tax Code, which were neglected at that time.