Deputy Head of Presidential Administration Hanna Herman, in a TV interview, was queried about a $60K wrist watch she was seen flaunting in public recently.
She replies: "I have lived in Ukraine and in this world for many years now. And I did not come to the presidential administration [straight] from the street. I have earned well all of my life." [Prior to becoming Yanukovych's press secretary in 2004, Herman was a journalist - latterly director of that gold mine, Radio Svoboda in Kyiv]
Herman, now a mere civil servant, added: "Partly people gift me things, partly I bought them myself. I have many things from previous years. I'm 50 years old. I'm not a girl that came from the street to the presidential administration and grabs things here. I have no factories, I have no yachts, I have no trains. But I can earn enough for a jacket and a brooch. I have several pairs of quite expensive watches that colleagues gave me, the prices of which I learned from the Internet".
$60K is equivalent to 10 to15 years average salary in Ukraine...
p.s. Ukraine in 146th position, is perceived to be more corrupt that Mozambique, Nicaragua, Uganda, Cameroon, Ecuador, and Timor, and is only one position above Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe. Ukraine is 34 spots above Somalia, the most corrupt country in the world..
Herman's brazen responses do little to improve Ukraine's image.
p.p.s. Hanna H. you should have said, "From hubby, from hubby!" or... "Another 60 monthly instalments, and it will be mine!"
1 comment:
I read that same interview.
That's not the only thing that jumps out.
Did you notice her answer when Mustafa Nayem asked her about Mezhihirya, the r400-acre mansion estate that Yanukonvict stole from the government - with Yushchenko's help?
"Oh, Mustafa, you've asked about it before, including directly to the president on TV [it was on the Savik Shuster show, and Yanuconvict said that he would not "justify" himself to a journalist - only to the people]."
She then goes on - "you can write about it all you want, Mustafa."
My translation is not literal, but it is fair.
And the thugs in power have decided that they will simply continue to rob and steal out in the open, for everyone to see, and the journalists can ask about it and write about it all they want.
They're not going to stop the robbing and stealing.
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