Deputies are ready to raise the issue of the dismissal of the NBU governor

The decisiveness of members of the Verkhovna Rada is heating up radicalism on the streets

People’s deputies followed in the footsteps of the public demanding the dismissal of the head of the National Bank of Ukraine Valeria Hontareva. Next week she will deliver a report in the Verkhovna Rada after which a number of factions will insist on voting for the dismissal of the NBU governor. Of course, there are different views regarding the departure of Hontarev in the parties of the president and the premier.

A meeting that never happened

Yesterday, the VR Committee on Financial Policy and Banking unanimously passed a decision to submit to the parliament the resolution on the immediate report of the head of the NBU Valeria Hontareva on the state of the monetary and credit system in the country.

As Chair of the Committee Serhiy Rybalka (Radical Party) told Capital, according to the results of the report appeal to President Petro Poroshenko to dismiss Hontareva from her post will be approved. “At the conciliatory meeting held on December 22, I together with Oleh Lyashko will insist that this matter be included in the agenda so that it can be resolved in the plenary session,” said Rybalka.

Hontareva was invited to participate in yesterday’s meeting of the committee

together with activists of the “Financial Maidan”, who the day before blocked traffic outside the building of the NBU and demanded that she meet them.

The head of the central bank of Ukraine did not come to the meeting. Instead, Director of the NBU Legal Department Viktor Novikov was present in her place. He declined to respond to the enquiry of the committee’s secretary Maksym Polyakov (People’s Front) as to reason for Hontareva’s absence.

In a discussion with Capital activists said they are demanding that the NBU set the exchange rate of the hryvnia to the dollar at 5.50 for payers of hard currency loans, the interest rate at the moment that the loan agreement was signed and the dismissal of Hontareva.

“We came to the NBU several times, but Hontareva shirked her responsibility for the problems and is hiding from us. People don’t trust such a head of the NBU. We demand an explanation for what is going on and how things will be in the future,” activist Ivan Karasev told Capital.

Activists explain that their demands for the dismissal of Hontareva are due to the fact that she is not taking any actions as the head of the central bank. “They are simply waiting for a loan from the IMF, which the people end up having to pay back. The policy of the national bank is driving us to a second round of the Ilovaisk incident, though in this case in the financial sphere,” says activist Tatyana Rudenko.

Poroshenko Bloc is against the dismissal

What is interesting is that even members of the specialized committee do not have a common opinion on the issue of the exchange rate policy of the National Bank of Ukraine and the dismissal of its head. People’s deputy Viktor Romanyuk (People’s Front) reproaches the NBU for non-transparent work and corruption. He says that Hontareva as the head of the central bank should act publicly and not send to meetings the head of the legal department, who is not responsible for the monetary and credit policy of the NBU.

“Honestly speaking, we face a problem that must be resolved. This is the political responsibility of the head of the bank. It is for this purpose that she was appointed and this is why she was invited today,” he told the publication.

In order to deal with the accusations of non-transparent schemes in the process of refinancing of banks the chair of the committee Rybalko appealed to the NBU requesting that it provide information about which financial institutions are receiving refinancing and who is buying dollars on the interbank exchange.

“We must know who is earning money on the difference in the exchange rate and who is buying dollars for 16 hryvnia and selling it on the black market for 22 hryvnia,” he said.

In their turn, members of the Petro Poroshenko Bloc (PPB) say there is no talk about the dismissal of Hontareva. They claim that macro-economic indicators that the Cabinet of Ministers is not in a hurry to improve are to blame for the declining exchange rate of the hryvnia.

“Hontareva is ready to give up her post to anybody who wants it, but I don’t think anybody will assume such responsibility. The question of how to maintain the exchange rate by reserves of US $10 bn with imports of more than US $100 bn should be posed not only to Hontareva, but also to Premier Arseniy Yatsenyuk,” people’s deputy Pavlo Rizanenko (PPB) told Capital.

Hontareva’s predecessor Stepan Kubiv, who also won a deputy seat in the Verkhovna Rada on the list of the presidential party, told Capital that the report to the parliament does not yet mean dismissal as the decision lies with the president. He explained that the macro-economic stability of the country is being maintained by monetary and fiscal instruments at the disposal of Yatsenyuk, while Hontareva was appointed governor of the NBU this past summer. “There are no tangible or visible reforms in Ukraine and the corruption is rampant, which means that foreign investors will not even think about investing their money in the country. Moreover, the level of speculation on the hard currency market is exorbitantly high,” Kubiv added.