Ukraine President Fires Premier Over Economy

Ukrainian President Leonid D. Kuchma fired Prime Minister Yevhen Marchuk on Monday, blaming him for the former Soviet republic’s economic crisis.

“Premier Yevhen Marchuk did not effectively carry out his duties in running the government,” Kuchma’s press office said in a statement.

“Rather than fulfilling his day-to-day duties, he has most recently been using all his energy to promote his own political image.”

In formally firing Marchuk, 55, who is also a member of the Ukrainian parliament, Kuchma stated that the law forbids deputies to occupy any government post.

But the prime minister’s spokeswoman, Larisa Ivshyna, told reporters that the official reason for sacking Marchuk--who was elected to parliament in December 1995, six months after becoming prime minister--was only a pretext.

“Until now, his duties were not a problem while he carried out his work as prime minister. More than half of the government are deputies,” Ivshyna said.

Government officials who met with Kuchma following the firing said First Deputy Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko, a close ally of the president, would succeed Marchuk.

Relations between Kuchma and Marchuk have grown increasingly strained in recent months.

Sources in the presidential office have said Kuchma, elected in July 1994, saw Marchuk as a political threat who might be a potential rival for the presidency. Elections are due in 1999 but could be called earlier.

The decision to fire Marchuk was made at a regular morning meeting between Kuchma and government ministers.

The presidential press office quoted Kuchma as telling the meeting that Ukraine’s economic situation is worsening and that the country is approaching a state of social crisis.

“The reasons for these negative facts do not only lie in Ukraine’s transition from a centrally planned to a market economy and in the difficulties that come with implementing economic reform,” it quoted him as saying.

“Mostly they are the fault of the ineffective work of the government.”

The firing came on the heels of a major speech by Marchuk to parliament a week ago. He pleaded for Ukraine to follow a softer approach to economic reform and said tight economic policy had plunged the country into a $1-billion wage payment crisis and caused a drop in production.