Tkachenko's finances under investigation (05/21/00)

Tkachenko's finances under investigation

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - A parliamentary ad hoc investigative committee on May 16 accused former Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Oleksander Tkachenko of failing to properly administer more than 50 million hrv ($9.3 million) in government funds and recommended that the procurator general review the matter to determine whether criminal charges should be brought.

The committee charged that the Parliament's administrative bodies, which Mr. Tkachenko oversaw, had awarded contracts for capital renovation without seeking tenders and had failed to collect certifications that the contracted work was actually completed. It found that Mr. Tkachenko's office overspent freely, exceeding by 73,000 hrv its 105,000 hrv. budget. And, in perhaps the most serious charge, it accused the former Parliament leader of spending almost 1 million hrv on purchases and renovations to his state-supplied vacation home.

"As a result of irrational expenditures, the inflating of costs and the like, more than 50 million hrv was wasted," said Yaroslav Kendzior, chairman of the ad hoc investigative committee, during his presentation before the parliamentary body.

Mr. Kendzior's special investigative committee was formed on January 21 in one of the first acts by the newly formed center-right political majority coalition after it dismissed Mr. Tkachenko as the leader of the Parliament for gross violations of parliamentary procedures. The chairman was voted out during an unconventional parliamentary session held outside the confines of the Verkhovna Rada Building after Mr. Tkachenko refused several times to allow for a vote of confidence in his leadership.

Whether the results of almost four months of work by the Kendzior committee will be supported by the Verkhovna Rada quickly came under question on May 16 after the report was severely criticized by opponents. Several national deputies, including Mr. Tkachenko, called the Kendzior committee's work illegal and questioned its motivation. After limited debate they succeeded in suspending debate on the issue.

National Deputy Oleksander Moroz of the Socialist faction and a leading opposition member, persuasively explained to the parliamentary body that President Leonid Kuchma had vetoed a bill on parliamentary ad hoc investigative committees and had ordered executive bodies not to cooperate with them - which makes the committee's work legally dubious.

Mr. Tkachenko accused the committee of bias because it included only members of the majority coalition and no opposition members. He added that, in addition, the committee's findings could not be debated until the Constitutional Court decides the legality of Mr. Tkachenko's removal in January, an issue now before it.

Mr. Kendzior expressed no surprise that a majority of lawmakers voted to cut short debate. He explained that the report covered a wide breadth of parliamentary activities and brought into question the activities also of several members of the majority, who would rather that the findings not see the light of day.

"I believe that among the deputies we will be hard-pressed to find 226 people who will want to dot all the i's on the matter of Tkachenko," explained Mr. Kendzior. "The thing here is that the committee greatly expanded the scope of its work and among the names that figure in the report are members of the majority. Of course, the question in these cases is not about criminal activity but about small improprieties."

The Kendzior committee's findings split the Verkhovna Rada along ideological lines once again, with the left condemning the report on one of its leaders as an attempt to discredit it.

While Leonid Kravchuk, leader of the Coordinating Council of the majority coalition, voiced unqualified approval for the findings, Heorhii Kriuchkov of the Communist faction said the report was misleading. He gave as an example the criticism leveled for the expenditure of parliamentary funds to furnish and renovate Mr. Tkachenko's dacha, which he explained were minuscule compared to the lavish expenses for homes and dachas incurred by executive branch officials.

But some members of the majority coalition said they also believed that the charges were mired in politics and pettiness. National Deputy Dmytro Tabachnyk suggested that the report needlessly aired the Parliament's dirty laundry in public, while never directly showing what actions were illegal.

While referring to Mr. Kendzior's enumeration of the amount and types of domestic furnishings purchased for Mr. Tkachenko's dacha, Mr. Tabachnyk said: "You can't simply talk about the number of certain objects, but must explain whether they were obtained within the legal confines of the budget of the Verkhovna Rada."

In response, Mr. Kendzior said criticism of the report is merely an expression of the twisted mindset of some national deputies.

"It's this type of psychology: Let's say that somebody in fact did do something improperly. But then why should we dump our trash outside the walls of the Parliament? And more so, why should we hand it over to the procurator so that they too can go through our dirty laundry. That's why the desire to close this issue as quickly as possible will dominate," explained Mr. Kendzior.

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