MPs, after two weeks of inactivity, today will again gather in the Assembly hall. This week, the Parliament will need to “stuff” MPs to committees and to deal with the issue of its budget. “Today” learned about the challenges facing BP in the near future.
MONEY ON YOURSELF. During yesterday’s conciliatory Council of the heads of the factions, the speaker of Parliament Andriy Parubiy stressed that in the near future it is necessary to distribute free of MPs on committees. Note that to date, no such in Parliament 27 people. “I appeal to the head of Procedural Committee we were able to come to a decision, and deputies who do not go into the composition of the committees, were distributed by him”, — said the speaker. This initiative was supported by the Chairman of the faction PPO Igor gryniv. Also in his address to colleagues, he stressed that today we need to finally approve the budget of the Verkhovna Rada: “We need to restore order in Parliament. We must now approve the budget of BP and to act in accordance with it, not on a whim. This week is a good time to complete the organizational work of the Parliament”. Political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko explains that in conditions when the Parliament’s budget is not adopted, Parliament is working on last year’s estimate (941 UAH). He also explained why the document is still not accepted: “Everything depends on the fact that it registered the increase of salaries for MPs. This is a concern that many factions don’t want to risk to be substituted, don’t want to look too materialistic to the voters. But the question of budget must be addressed, and I do not exclude that in the near future attempt to vote it will be.” We will remind, this year on the costs of BP planned 1 billion 128 million UAH.
THE REGISTRY AND ANNIVERSARY. In addition, in the published agenda for this week there is the separate issue of creating a Unified state register of military personnel. If the Parliament will give him on Thursday the green light, then it will be only for the Cabinet — it needs to adopt the mechanism of its work. Recall that in the registry will be made of all Ukrainians aged 18 to 60 years, and it is necessary to plan the mobilization and accounting for potential contractors.
And the culmination of this plenary week will be the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Ukrainian parliamentarism, which the MPs will say on Friday. “We will celebrate 100 years since the day when I started to work the Central Rada. So we have until Friday 12:30 to review all the questions and then to hold a solemn meeting,” concluded Parubiy.
THE CARE SIDE. Fesenko believes that the current agenda of Rada should be urgent. Now there are severe problems, which require consideration by our partners. Thus, in particular, he talks about the creation of a special anti-corruption courts. “This is signalled in the relations with the IMF and other partners. So this theme somehow needs to rise. Another issue has to do with NABOO: even with last year, BP is the bill, which should provide an opportunity for the NEB to listen to their suspects (today’s Bureau in this matter depends on the SBU. — Ed.). And if our partners will firmly insist on it, sooner or later Parliament will adopt this law,” says
the expert.
However, his colleague Vadim Karasev believes that MPs will try to confront serious issues: “the Important thing is that now we need MPs to support the Memorandum with the IMF in order to access tranche of $1 billion, But as of now for the adoption of the Memorandum in the Parliament votes no, and even just the discussion of it will be raised, this issue would be to replace the secondary issues.”
First question — trade with Canada
Issue which MPs will consider today in the first place, will be the ratification of the agreement on free trade zone between Ukraine and Canada. In the explanatory note to the document are relatively modest numbers, and according to experts, the FTA will add Ukrainian GDP is just $86 thousand a year. However, the adviser to the Prime Minister Valery Pyatnitsky said that, in this case, you need to look at the numbers: “to Say that this agreement will give sharp rise in the economy, is extremely difficult. Terms of trade in Canada is not the motor for our development and we can not say that this document will promote the growth of our trade volumes ten times. Another thing is the political aspect. It is a country “Big seven”. And positioning of our products, even in small amounts, can often provide the impetus for entering third markets. We can say that a respectable presence in the market for some kind of sign of quality for our products.”
