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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
Resignations are being prepared in the Presidential Office and the government: Tymoshenko and Halushchenko are expected to be dismissed, media report
Vadym Huttsait and Pavlo Ryabikin may also lose their positions.
Resignations are expected soon in the Presidential Office and the government. The cases concern Deputy Head of the Presidential Office Kyrylo Tymoshenko and Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko.
Youth and Sports Minister of Ukraine Vadym Huttsait may also be dismissed. And Minister for Strategic Industries of Ukraine Pavlo Ryabikin may be dismissed and appointed as Ukraine’s ambassador to China. Several sources in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine told LB about this.
"Regarding resignations, expect these to be: Deputy Head of the Presidential Office Kyrylo Tymoshenko, Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko. Probably it’s not very correct that our substation issues are being handled by Kubrakov (Minister of Infrastructure and Regional Development – Ed.), given that we have a relevant minister. We should also expect the resignation of the Deputy Defense Minister for procurements," a source said.
The Deputy Minister of Defense for procurements is Bohdan Khmelnytsky — a subject of a scandal over a contract for supplying food to the Armed Forces of Ukraine at allegedly inflated prices.
Another LB.ua source from the Servant of the People faction added that "theoretically next to go: Youth and Sports Minister Vadym Huttsait and Minister for Strategic Industries Pavlo Ryabikin."
"What is the motivation for these ministers? And what results? Zero," the deputy noted.
Another interlocutor suggested that personnel decisions could be broader in scope.
"Because everything is burning so much right now that, in my opinion, it could end up even more broadly. The case with Lozynskyi (Deputy Minister of Development of Communities, who is implicated in a bribery case of $400 thousand) is demonstrative. He is completely a person of Prime Minister Shmyhal," he said.
A source from another faction noted that there will not be a dismissal of the entire government.
"I don’t think it will be that radical. Because currently there is no movement, no one has started collecting votes for Shmyhal’s dismissal. There are also no votes for appointing a new head of government. Regarding personnel, Tymoshenko — minus. Actually the last trigger was his Porsche story. That’s a red rag for Western partners. They insisted on his dismissal. Minister Halushchenko — also a minus. Ryabikin — also exiting, likely he will go as ambassador to China. Defense Minister Reznikov will remain," the MP predicts.
Neither Kyrylo Tymoshenko nor Herman Halushchenko confirmed their resignations to LB.ua at the end of the last working week.
"Nobody has talked to me about this," Halushchenko said. Tymoshenko gave a similar response.
If Ryabikin resigns, the question of reformatting his ministry logically arises. There are two main scenarios — splitting functions between the Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Digital Transformation, or creating a specialized agency within the Ministry of Defense. The second option seems more logical given wartime requirements, but the final decision must be made by the Presidential Office.
According to LB.ua, the relevant concept proposals were submitted by the Cabinet of Ministers to the Presidential Office back in the summer. At the same time, Ryabikin was told the proposal to "return to diplomatic work if needed." Currently this concerns the post of Ukraine’s ambassador to China, but it should be noted that equivalent ambassadorial posts remain vacant in countries such as India, Norway, the Czech Republic, and others.
Recall that at the end of last year there was talk of a large-scale reform of the entire cabinet structure — reducing the number of ministries, optimizing them, but the project was not implemented (read in detail here).
There is no data yet regarding a possible dismissal of Dnipropetrovsk OVA head Valentyn Reznichenko. Reznichenko is implicated in a scandal over the allocation of record funds for road reconstruction in the region. The company handling the reconstruction is linked to a close friend of Reznichenko.
Data published by other media about preparations to dismiss Deputy Head of the Presidential Office Oleh Tatarov were not confirmed by LB.ua sources. Moreover, the outlet’s interlocutors do not rule out that he will now try to extend his influence to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which after the helicopter crash in Boryspil was left without a full minister, a first deputy, and a state secretary.
Information about preparations to dismiss Minister of Education and Science Serhiy Shkarlet is also not confirmed for now; early in his appointment as acting minister he was marked by scandals regarding possible plagiarism in his dissertation (read Shkarlet’s own comment on this in his first interview in office).
Sources link such rumors to the ongoing conflict between the Ministry of Education and the relevant parliamentary committee.
Herman Halushchenko was appointed Minister of Energy in April 2021. He became the first full-fledged Minister of Energy of Ukraine in 1,5 years — before him there had been acting ministers.
Kyrylo Tymoshenko has held the post of Deputy Head of the Presidential Office since 2019. After the dismissal of First Deputy Head of the Presidential Office Serhiy Trofimov, he began overseeing regional policy. Initially Tymoshenko was responsible for information.
During the presidential campaign of 2019 he worked in the headquarters of presidential candidate Volodymyr Zelensky, responsible for media and creative aspects of the campaign, and was part of the inauguration organizing committee.
During the full-scale invasion he was involved in several scandals. First, Bihus.info journalists published an investigation that Tymoshenko used an official Chevrolet Tahoe. That vehicle was donated as humanitarian aid by the American company General Motors.
Later, Ukrainska Pravda reported that Tymoshenko used businessman Vemir Davityan’s car worth $100 000 and rented an estate from construction company owner Nikonov.
Tymoshenko is the public overseer of the construction direction, and Nikonov’s business operates in that field. Asked about a possible conflict of interest, the deputy head of the Presidential Office responded that Nikonov does not participate in state projects.
But a few weeks after that statement, a message appeared on the page of Nikonov’s construction company that two residential quarters of KAN Development joined the state program "eOselya" — preferential mortgage housing.
Note that NABU is investigating proceedings related to the "Big Construction" program. In December, searches in this case took place in Dnipro, including at the OGA head Valentyn Reznichenko and at the contractor company involved in reconstruction of infrastructure. That company is Budinvest Engineering, linked to Reznichenko’s friend Yana Khlanta. Coordinator of the "Big Construction," Yurii Holyk, was also searched.
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