Tymoshenko wants on the carpet 5 governors whose oblasts post highest inflation rate

June03200820:09

Premier Yulia Tymoshenko has plans to hear reports by 5 governors from oblasts with the highest rate of inflation. “At our Wednesday cabinet session we will hear reports of five governors whose oblasts posted inflation instead of deflation,” she warned June 3, speaking to oblast governors at a telephone conference.

According to The Ukrayinska Pravda, Premier Tymoshenko asked the State Statistics Committee to name 5 oblasts with the highest rate of inflation, adding the governors must be ready to report to the cabinet. During a June 3 cabinet session, the premier said that in some oblasts consumer goods and food prices go down while in others grow. She stressed that oblast governors as well as the premier are responsible for curbing inflation in the country.

In particular, the premier was angered by the fact that chicken meat prices in Kyiv went up while in the regions they declined. “In Kyiv, the hike is 22%, and I call it economic blackmail,” Tymoshenko said.

She reminded the governors that the law on prices and pricing envisages the governors’ responsibility for beating inflation.

The premier strongly criticized the oblasts where a loaf of bread costs over 2.25 hryvnia, an average for Ukraine. “In the oblasts where bread prices are higher than the average there is a May Day situation, and we must urgently react to it,” Tymoshenko said.

Comment by ZIK

May 12, first Vice Premier Oleksandr Turchynov announced that the cabinet will petition the president to dismiss those oblast governors who allegedly sabotaged cabinet decisions.

The cabinet demanded reports by five governors from oblasts Zaporizhya, Lviv, Kherson, Cherkasy, and Crimea. The governor of Volyn oblast was also summoned to explain large wage arrears.

The May 14 cabinet session did not endorse a petition to the president to sack the governors guilty of food price hikes and wage arrears.