Draft foresees death of over 300,000 Ukrainians

If the Thursday session of the Cabinet of Ministers had been shown on television, the No. 1 presidential candidate could have kissed his political future goodbye.

All the words of the incumbent seeking reelection about «obvious achievements» and further plans of development pale in the light just one figure from the 2000 draft budget under discussion at the Cabinet session. According to this draft, «in 2000, the average statistical population of this country will be 49.606 million (49.932 million in 1999),» Interfax-Ukraine reports. At the same time, the number of officially registered unemployed will increase by almost 400,000 to reach 2 million.

This clarifies the methods by which the draft budget assesses the rise of average monthly wages for blue-collar and white-collar workers to UAH 208.1 and those for collective farmers to UAH 99. The money of those thrown out of the labor market will be distributed among those left.

A powerful mine has been planted in the budget. As chairman of the parliamentary budget expenditure subcommittee Oleksandr Turchynov told The Day , Ukraine's foreign debts will be UAH 11.4 billion at the beginning of 2000, which he says is in fact half the state budget. Out of this amount, UAH 7.5 billion is to be repaid in 2000. According to Mr. Turchynov, it is planned to borrow UAH 6.8 billion in new loans to cover this. But at the beginning of next year, in Mr. Turchynov's opinion, a hard-currency gap could develop between these two figures with the loans granted insufficient to service previously acquired debt.

This explains the government's intention to form a budget surplus. But this raised the outcry of almost all representatives of such agencies as the Defense, Coal, Labor, Social Policy Ministries, and the Pension Fund, which can be considered a real crisis in the executive branch. The Ministry of Finance and State Tax Administration were instructed to rework the draft and increase revenues. Is it worth asking at whose expense those revenues will increase? It is not to be ruled out that as a result the Ukrainian population's mortality rate would exceed even the one outlined in this draft. Does this not call for Ukrainian voters to call to account the person who now heads the executive and, despite the universally known consequences of his actions, still wants another term? Does our country have people who will vote for the extinction of their nation?