Media: Ukrainian Finance Minister complains to G7 ambassadors about pressure from Poroshenko
Apostrophe news outlet, citing the news portal Comments, reports that Ukrainian Finance Minister Oleksandr Danylyuk notified the ambassadors of the G7 countries that President Petro Poroshenko has been putting political pressure on him.
According to the portal’s sources in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, the Minister complained to the Ambassadors that Poroshenko was trying to force him to appoint certain candidates as his deputies. The publication’s source specified that Danylyuk himself is trying to appoint Yana Bugrimova as his deputy, and that over two years the Minister has already nominated her as a candidate for government consideration four times.
"The President strongly insisted on appointing people who are lobbied for by [Ihor] Kononenko [and/or Nina] Yuzhanina…he insisted on [Ihor] Umansky, and later on Svitlana Vorobei, threatening to block my candidacy if I did not comply. I refused him because such appointments should be based on professionalism and reputation, and not on the basis of loyalty to him; otherwise it destabilizes the work of the Ministry," the source quoted the Minister as saying to the G7 ambassadors.
According to Danylyuk, this letter is "a ‘set-up’ for the president" and a reason to open a case in the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU).
"The Minister is obliged to give public explanations about the accusations that were made against the Head of State in his letter to the ambassadors. If Danylyuk’s statements are fake, he must be held accountable for libel, [and] his continued tenure in the civil service becomes impossible. If [they are] not, an assessment of this situation should be given by NABU ", the portal’s source added.
The Ukrainian media earlier reported that Danylyuk wrote to the ambassadors of G7 countries last week just prior to a visit by Ukrainian Prime Volodymyr Groysman to Brussels, complaining that "he [Danylyuk] was not allowed to work."
Ihor Umansky previously served as First Deputy Minister of Finance for Ukraine and became an adviser to President Poroshenko in 2016.
Svitlana Vorobei is Deputy Head of the Secretariat of the Committee for Tax and Customs Policy in the Verkhovna Rada. Nina Yuzhanina serves as the Chairman for this committee.