"The impression is that the president is following some unwritten rules to consciously or unconsciously tell lies and mislead the society, at the same time feeling correct and equally fair to everyone, as required by the Constitution," Gedvilas, a member of the ruling Labor Party, said in a communiqué circulated on Monday.
He reminds that Grybauskaitė, in comment of the proposed VAT privilege on fresh meat pending at the parliament, said that the privilege was "in the direct interest of one of the coalition partners" and would give it 200 million litas (EUR 58m).
"It is hard for me to imagine how the amendments could give one company in the Lithuanian meat processing sector 200 million litas. The law does not specify a company owned by Uspaskich or anybody else," Gedvilas said.
Last Thursday, parliament voted down a proposal to introduce 5-percent VAT rate on fresh and frozen meat, to replace the current rate of 21 percent. The Finance Ministry said the amendment would deprive the budget of an annual 200 million litas. A draft amendment on VAT privilege for meat was also registered by the Labor Party.
Gedvilas also said he could not tolerate efforts to divide parliament and single out certain political groups by humiliating certain politicians and celebrating others.
"I cannot tolerate seeing that one coalition partner – the Social Democratic Party – is singled out and supported as decent and fair, while others are humiliated and referred to as populists, with an emphasis on how difficult it is for the government of Algirdas Butkevičius to work. The ruling coalition is unified and stable, and all the partners are equal," said the leader of the parliament.
In an interview to BNS in mid-June, Grybauskaitė stated that proposals made by coalition partners impede the performance of the Social Democrats and Butkevičius's government.
The ruling center-left coalition includes the Lithuanian Social Democratic Party, the Labor Party, the Order and Justice party, and the Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania.
