Former President Petro Poroshenko asked former United States vice president Joseph Biden to pressure the Samopomich parliamentary faction to support appointment of former finance minister Nataliia Yaresko as Ukraine’s prime minister in 2016.
This is evidenced by tapes of conversations between Biden and Poroshenko, which Member of Parliament Andrii Derkach (independent) made public on Tuesday, the Ukrainian News Agency reports.
“With the refusal of Tymoshenko and Liashko, we do not have the 226 votes required to support Yaresko without Samopomich. As I understand it, our partners and our American friends have a significant influence on the leaders of Samopomich, and I have asked Pavlo to call Tory and contact the ambassador for possible increase of pressure on Samopomich to support Yaresko’s candidacy,” a voice resembling that of Poroshenko said.
During the conversation with Biden, Poroshenko emphasized that he did not have a coalition in the parliament and that appointment of Yaresko as prime minister was impossible without the required number of votes.
According to him, Samopomich refused to join the coalition but set three conditions for voting in favor of formation of a coalition.
These conditions include replacement of the prosecutor general, personnel changes in the Central Election Commission (CEC), and amendment of the Electoral Code.
He said that he contacted Samopomich’s leader Andrii Sadovyi, but he refused to support Yaresko.
He said that the parliament would approve appointment of Yaresko if Samopomich backed her candidacy but added that the Poroshenko team would begin negotiations on appointment of Volodymyr Groysman to the post if Samopomich refused to back Yaresko.
Derkach told the press conference that he obtained the tape of the conversation between Biden and Poroshenko from investigative journalists.
According to him, Poroshenko personally the recorded these conversations.
Derkach said that the tapes were sent to him specifically because he and his fellow parliamentarians and journalists were gathering evidence of corruption among senior Ukrainian government officials.
According to him, the tapes were recorded from late 2015 to 2016.
As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, Poroshenko proposed appointing Yurii Lutsenko to replace Viktor Shokin as Ukraine’s prosecutor general in exchange for disbursement of an International Monetary Fund loan tranche of USD 1 billion during a conversation with Biden.
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