Viktor Suslov Claims NBU Malfeasance Established

Facts of illegal use of foreign currency reserves listed in a letter from the Security Service of Ukraine have been confirmed, stated Viktor Suslov, chairman of the temporary commission to investigate the National Bank, in an interview with UNIAN. In his words, the commission had established that the sum lost run into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Commenting on Mr. Suslov's statement, "What are these loses?" NBU Director for foreign currency operations Serhiy Yaremenko asked. "Does it mean they were stolen? But I know that this just is not so. We answered in writing many of Viktor Suslov's inquiries, but where he sees losses, I just don't know."

Meanwhile, it is still not clear what kind of an institution the National Bank should be and what role it should play in the nation's economy. The law on the National Bank has not been passed, with issue of its independence being the obstacle. The opponents of NBU independence tend to support their position be referring to actual and fictitious shortcomings in the bank's work.

NBU Governor Viktor Yushchenko, Infobank reports, has recently labeled "fruitless" the debates now underway in Parliament and the government on which is better: "to keep a stable hryvnia and have a dead economy" or to sacrifice the stability of the national currency in order to replenish the current assets of enterprises and give an impetus to economic development. He is convinced that the National Bank should only perform regulatory and not crediting functions (including emission). Mr. Yushchenko believes that the NBU's main instrument should be the mandatory reserve requirements for commercial banks and not the discount rate. Nor does Mr. Yushchenko see any economic reason for a further reduction of the discount rate (in April, the NBU cut it from 60 to 57%).

Prior to Verkhovna Rada hearings, The Day asked Commission [on investigating National Bank activities] Secretary Volodymyr Fialkovsky to inform readers about his colleagues' new "discoveries" (an interview with him was carried by The Day, March 16).

V. F.: Our biggest discovery is that there is a great deal of work to be done. Actually, what we have so far is more questions than answers, although we do have some answers. We have uncovered facts and stumbled onto such staggering amounts of money that the end of our work is even farther away now than when we started. Moreover, even now the National Bank gives us more subjects to broach. Under the law it was supposed to revoke the licenses of 37 commercial banks failing to comply with the requirement that their authorized capital stock be at least one million ECU. This monetary unit is no longer in circulation, as you know. It has been replaced by the euro. NBU submitted a draft Cabinet resolution whereby the bank will stop controlling commercial banks in this respect. Of course, the draft was rejected. We cannot have banks with $5 in capital. Deputy NBU Governor Yaroslav Soltys said his bank, as the most competent financial authority in Ukraine, considers that in the absence of the ECU the licenses should not be revoked. I asked if this was the NBU's official stand. He replied in the affirmative. My next question was what about excise and customs payments? They are also in terms of ECU. Are there to be no payments from now on?

For an exclusive interview with deputy chairman of the NBU inspection commission Volodymyr Fialkovsky see page Day after Day.