Ukraine on Wednesday sacked the head of the country’s state-run oil and gas company Naftogaz, fuelling allegations of political wrangling in the country embroiled in a fight against systemic corruption.
Andriy Kobolev was appointed Naftogaz head in 2014, after massive street protests ousted Ukraine’s pro-Russian president, and his transparency reforms won the approval of Ukraine’s allies in Washington and European capitals.
Under his tenure, operations at Naftogaz were seen as having become both more profitable and more transparent, after years of perceived mismanagement and graft.
The government on Wednesday also suspended all members of Naftogaz’s supervisory board, a move analysts said could spur concerns among Ukraine’s Western donors.
The cabinet said that Kobolev — well-known for leading Naftogaz to victory in a legal battle with Russian energy giant Gazprom — was dismissed after the company posted losses of 19.0 billion hryvnia ($685 million) in 2020.
“I learned of my dismissal from the news reports,” 42-year-old Kobolev said on Facebook.
Naftogaz denounced the decision describing it as politically motivated and argued that the company provided more than $5 billion to the state budget last year.
It said the cabinet’s decision was a signal to state-run enterprises that their work “in the interests of the budget and the Ukrainian people, and not in those of certain political forces, will be punished”.
Acting energy minister and former executive director of Naftogaz, Yuriy Vitrenko, was appointed to replace Kobolev.
Kobolev was made Naftogaz head in the wake of Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the outbreak of war with Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.
He managed to reduce Ukraine’s dependence on Russian gas deliveries and led reforms that improved the company’s public image.
Under his tenure, the Stockholm arbitration court in 2017 ordered Gazprom to pay $2.56 billion to Naftogaz for failing to compensate the Ukrainian company fees to transport Russian gas to Europe.
Ukraine, one of Europe’s poorest countries is deeply dependent on international loans, including from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which has handed Kiev cash on the condition it will implement reforms to wipe out corruption.
Tymothy Ash, a London-based economist, said on Twitter that the suspension of the supervisory board “might be a bit difficult to explain to the IMF”.
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