Posted on 02/16/2005 3:56:59 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko says her government plans to review some 3,000 privatizations to ensure they were conducted fairly.
The Interfax news agency quotes her as saying Wednesday that the state will get back what was illegally handed over to what she called "private but dishonest hands."
She has already ordered authorities to begin the process of returning the country's largest steel mill, Kryvorizhstal, to government control.
A consortium that included the son-in-law, Viktor Pinchuk, of former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma purchased the complex last year for $800 million, far below its estimated market value.
Many privatizations in Ukraine took place under questionable circumstances after the fall of the Soviet Union.
"She has already ordered authorities to begin the process of returning the country's largest steel mill, Kryvorizhstal, to government control"
Oh, Western values... having the state take over private property, as the first act of the Yushchenko administration.
(sarcasm)
What do the Yushchenko supporters have to say about this?
If Putin did anything like that, they would demand that we invade Russia to keep democracy.
Under Yanukovich, businesses were privatized, comes Yushchenko and he is nationalizing everything -- the state is taking over private property and the owners have no say it it.
I hope the Yushchenko supporters are happy now. :(
Mr Yushchenko, who is desperate to win foreign investment, promised the review of the former government's privatisation deals would not go too far. He said the list would be made public "in the nearest future". Most of the assets would be reprivatised. He also promised not to review the privatisation of any companies not on the list once it was published."We respect owners and their interests, and we will defend them," Mr Yushchenko said.
The president, a liberal former central banker, has raised hopes that Ukraine will follow its neighbours in central Europe and make foreign investment a central component of its economic strategy.
Mr Yushchenko pledged to improve the investment climate with liberal reforms and a strict anti-corruption drive. He said he regretted that Ukraine had so far received just $165 (€127, £87) of foreign direct investment on a per capita basis, compared with $2,100 in Poland and $4,200 in the Czech Republic.
However, the president said his top priority would be to enforce tax collection and end some exemptions in order to finance pay rises for teachers, doctors and other public employees. He said Ukraine's state revenues came to only 27 per cent of its gross domestic product while other central European countries collected more than 40 per cent of their GDP.
Mr Yushchenko said he expected the Kryvorizhstal steel mill, sold last year to local businessmen for $800m, would fetch "three to four times more" after it was returned to state hands and then resold in a "transparent" auction open to foreign bidders.
The Siverskodonetsk Azot ammonia fertiliser plant, several metal ore mines and the Dniprovsky steel mill are also expected to be on the list. - Financial Times
At least they are reselling it, unlike the property Putin has nationalized under "KremPec" state control.
RBC, 16.02.2005, Kiev 09:25:28.The Russian company Severstal is planning to take part in the repeated tender for state shares in the Ukrainian metal works Krivorozhstal, Arkadiy Volskiy, president of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, has said at a news conference in Kiev. According to him, Russian investors are also showing interest in other strategic assets in Ukraine in connection with a revision of the privatization program in that country.
Volskiy emphasized that Russia did not view Ukraine's plans for integration with the EU as an obstacle to the development of mutually beneficial economic relations and trade between the two countries. He noted that a number of Russian investors had already voiced their readiness to cooperate with Ukrainian companies. In Volskiy's opinion, hi-tech is the most promising sector for Russian-Ukrainian Cooperation.
Yushchenko has also been going around the eastern Ukraine out right firing governors and replacing them with his lackies, no elections necessary. These guys start an uproar about Russia doing this, regardless of the fact that in Russia, the local oblast (state) assembly actually has to vote to approve the candidate. In Ukraine, Yushchenko just replaces them minus the vote, as he likes.
"would fetch "three to four times more" after it was returned to state hands and then resold in a "transparent" auction open to foreign bidders."
The fine Ukrainian "patriot" is selling the country off to the highest bidders to enrich the state.
How would you like to buy something in a country, where a new government could come in, decide retroactively, that you didn't pay enough, take it away from you and sell it to someone at a higher price, because prices went up.
Suppose person A sells their house to person B, then two years later, person A finds out, that the house is now worth 50% more than what B paid for it. Do you think that person A should be able to take his ex-house back from person B, and then sell it for 50% more on the market today? Or do you think, that any gains belong to person B?
The Yushchenko government is starting out with state greed and dishonesty. Of course anyone with any sense could have figured it out, just from the fact that Soros was supporting him. And do you think Soros will not profit from all this? If you think that, I have bridges and buildings to sell you.
You defend Russia when it does this so you hardly have room to complain when Ukraine does.
Did you want to ping your Ukraine ping list on this?
I think this vindicates all of us, who could see Yushchenko for what he really was: a greedy socialist, while a lot of others fell for his con game hook, line, and sinker.
Soros is laughing his head off, right about now.
The ex-president Kuchma sold this steel mill for pennies on the dollar to his own son-in-law, who happens to be a close friend and business associate of George Soros.
So you think Putin is also a greedy socialist for nationalizing Yukos?
You have to be on the ground there to really get the perspective.
Basically the assets involved in the privatization were looted by characters that most anyone would hate.
Yukos is not a good example, they also ripped off assets from common folks and then ignored tax law.
A good analogy to think of so as to understand the anger is the K-Mart bankruptcy,
As K-Mart declared Chapter 11, the common shareholders were wiped out because of bogus valuations of assets.
In short, auditors were in the pocket of vultures looking to get control of assets at pennies on the dollar. They did this by presenting a false report of the value of the corporate assets.
As soon as the liar creditors gained control of the assets, K-Mart emerged from Chapter 11 and what do you know, the assets suddenly gained value overnight. And the creditors sold them at huge profit.
In summary, they stole value from shareholders. The anger of bankrupt K-Mart common shareholders is nothing compared to the anger of Russians and Ukrainians against some of the scum carpetbaggers that ripped them off and then escaped to Switzerland and other places with billions.
Russians and Ukrainians cannot understand why Americans do not sympathize with them in this. If we as Americans got a clearer picture on who are the good guys and who are not, it would go along way toward establishing a generational harmony between East and West. And we as Americans need the Eastern Slavic populations in the War on Terror.
Yukos is ONE company, which had financial problems and I understand didn't pay their taxes -- the IRS can foreclose on your business here too, if you don't pay your taxes.
Yushchenko barely came into power and his first act is to take back thousands of businesses, which have been privatized. It's obvious where his priorities lie and it's not at helping Ukraine. He is nothing, but a figurehead for Soros.
It's time to wake up and smell reality and learn from it, so maybe next time you won't be duped so easily.
I think it is fair to speculate that under Kuchma many of these formerly state-owned enterprises were handed over (gifts, really) to cronies and mobsters. Bringing them back under state control temporarily to reassess the situation might not be a horrible idea.
"I think it is fair to speculate "
You are indeed speculating, as you say. You are just repeating the Yushchenko propaganda, with no facts to back up any of it.
Where is any evidence of that, other than what Yushchenko and Tymoshenko are saying?
Let's see how the new "leaders" of Ukraine treat the common people.
Corporations all over the world are eager to invest in Ukraine and bid on the resale of these companies which were stolen from the people by Kuchma's crooked oligarch cronies.
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