Government Manipulations

Well, Yanukovych  is at it once again or should I say still at it.  He has deflated the business protests by giving into some of their demands and breaking up their camp by force.  It is commonly believed that the leaders of the protests are being harrassed and intimidated into silence.  There appears to be plans for a resumption of the protests after the new year.
In the 2011 budget his government has plans to increase his personal expense account from 947,000,000 Hr. in 2010 to 1,344,000,000 Hr. for 2011 which is almost double that of 2009.  In this same budget the government has allocated over 3 billion Hr. for a rehabilitation centre for themselves.  Yanukovych is also preparing to buy three new planes for himself.  
He was on TV the other day announcing that it was an injustice that the minimum pension was so low compared to the maximum pension which is over 6000 Hr.  He has decided to correct this appalling situation by raising the  mimimum pension by a whole 34 Hr. or 45 cents Canadian  to 740 Hr. per month.   At the current rate of exchange this amounts to a pension of about 100 CAD.
Back in the summer he anounced that he wanted to close all national TV and radio stations and create one National (presumably pro-Yahukovych) station and now has asked the courts to close the only independant news channels, TVI and Channel 5.   At present these are the only channels that provide more factual coverage of what is really happening in Ukraine. As an example, a major news channel "News 24" showed the removal of protesters from Independance square as peaceful and orderly while TVI showed the police destroying property and carting off protesters, the announcer speculated where the confiscated equipment would end up.
Yahukovych is trying to deflate his opposition by having his court system charge former Tymoshenko ministers with various crimes. At present there is a minister being held in the Czech republic awaiting extradition,  Lutsenko has been in and out of court for the last several months on charges that he stole 34,000 Hr. and now the government is going after another minister, Philipchuk, on similar charges and yesterday it was anounced that the courts are bringing charges against Yulia herself.
Recently there was an anouncement that the Mohyla Academy was under attack by the government for using the English language in it's curriculum. The government wants students who don't know English to have access to the accademy, which is commendable.  However, the academy provides students with training comparable to western institutes by English language instructors and thus many of the classes are in the English language, and students, if they wish, can continue their education in the west.
Another recent developement is that the government is allowing the Orthodox church under the Moscow patriarch to have a tax exemption.  However, no other religeous group has that privledge.