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Where there is no law, but every man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real liberty
Henry M. Robert

Has Picketing Become a Nationwide Craze? Will farmers take their tractors to the Cabinet of Ministers?

13 November, 2012 - 00:00

No sooner did the miners leave when the new sufferers appeared, farmers. One June 30 under the watchful eye of the police, over 300 representatives of the Ukrainian Association of Farmers unfurled banners and posters in front of the Parliament demanding the "insane" taxes be revoked. In addition to this main demand were also "subsidiary" ones: allowing land to be bought and sold, establishing a rural credit system, etc.

Ivan Pliushch (in the photo) spent over an hour trying to explain these "backward" people why the state does not want and people cannot... If the authorities do not want the pickets promised "to take every tenth tractor from the fields to Kyiv" if their demands are not met. The Parliament is not the last picketing point; the Presidential Administration and Cabinet of Ministers still lie ahead.

The Day comments

Aide to the president of the Farmers Association of Ukraine's Yakiv Kyrychenko explained to The Day that the main demand of the pickets is to introduce a single agricultural tax, because farmers can hardly make ends meet under current taxation pressure. Kyrychenko underlined that the fixed tax introduced by presidential decree does not include all payments to the budget. In particular, it does not include the VAT.

Economists say the farmers' demands make some sense. It will take much time before their small economies purchase computer hardware and hire experienced bookkeepers. Without these two things you cannot even dream of having good relations with the tax service.

Photo by Volodymyr Rasner, The Day

 

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