Ethiotime1
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivers his nightly address from Kyiv on January 23. (President of Ukraine)
Two more deputy ministers have been dismissed from the Ukrainian government as part of the “personnel” changes announced by President Volodymyr Zelensky last night.
“At a meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on Jan. 24, a number of personnel decisions were made,” Oleh Nemchinov, the minister of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, said on Telegram.
He said that Viacheslav Nehoda, the deputy minister of Communities and Territories Development of Ukraine, and Vitalii Muzychenko, deputy minister of Social Policy of Ukraine, had been dismissed.
They join Viacheslav Shapovalov, a deputy minister of defense, and Ivan Lukerya, a deputy minister of Communities and Territories Development, in leaving the government.
The dismissals follow that of Vasyl Lozynskyy, the acting minister of Communities and Territories Development.
Ukraine’s Infrastructure Ministry said on Sunday that Lozynskyy had been arrested on suspicion of embezzlement. He has not commented on the allegations.
In a Facebook post published on Monday, Lozynsky’s lawyer, Oleksandr Tananakin, said his client had been dismissed “before he was notified of suspicion.”
“No funds, let alone in the amounts indicated by the NABU [National Anti-Corruption Bureau, which had accused him of receiving “unlawful benefits”], were found and seized from Mr. Lozynsky,” he said.
Tananakin accused the bureau of “deliberately using manipulative tactics to inform the public in order to artificially create a representation of Lozynsky’s guilt and form a negative image of him.”
In a post on his Facebook page, Nehoda said that he was “automatically subject to dismissal” because “in December, the Government decided to liquidate the Ministry of Regional Development.” He said that only two deputies were offered jobs with the minister and that all others automatically lost their jobs. “I didn’t write any letter of resignation, it’s not necessary at all,” he said.
In addition, the cabinet supported the dismissal of the governors of the Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Sumy and Kherson regions, Nemchinov said.
On Monday night, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had signaled that there would be changes to “personnel” within the Ukrainian government, without naming the people impacted.
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