Coalition talks at Ukrainian parliament fail miserably, Petro Poroshenko Bloc representative says

The talks to set up a new coalition in the Supreme Rada of Ukraine have failed, Mustafa Nayyem, the people’s deputy from Petro Poroshenko Bloc (PPB), said today, on March 29.

“We held a meeting of the committee and the ‘coalition.’ And I can state for sure that the talks have failed miserably. As far as I understand, Yulia Tymoshenko set forth some more conditions and we have no final decision yet,” Nayyem said.

Earlier, Rada Speaker Volodymyr Groysman said that today in the afternoon members of the new coalition comprising the Petro Poroshenko Bloc, the People’s Front, the Radical Party and the Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) party will meet. However, Batkivshchyna leader Yulia Tymoshenko said that her political party will not continue the coalition talks unless a package of laws is passed.

“We have repeatedly said that the utility rates are extremely high and not substantiated. They have turned the utility rates into one more tax for the people. We have set a clear demand to regulate these prices. To that end, it is necessary to pass a number of laws, reduce the state gas price,” Tymoshenko said. She addressed the agrarian sector of Ukraine, demanding an extension of the moratorium on land until 2019, a single agricultural tax for all farms occupying up to 400 ha of land, a fixed tax per ha of land.

“We have talked about all this as a precondition to joining the coalition. We do not trust either the government or the leaders of the parties and factions,” she said.

“We will continue the talks, but our condition is to vote for a package of laws that will regulate the situation in the country. Only afterwards, we will join the coalition. At first they will stop annihilating the people, and then we will join the coalition,” she said.

As EADaily reported earlier, President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko told parliamentarians yesterday that a new coalition and a new Cabinet should be formed by March 31 – ahead of his visit to the United States. Otherwise, the country will receive no financial aid from the West. In particular, Ukraine will not receive the $1 billion loan guarantees from U.S. and $3 billion assistance from IMF.