Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy criticized government officials over prolonged power outages in Bila Tserkva and Brovary. According to him, residents of the two cities were left without electricity not just for hours, but for days, while reports from the ground presented a different picture.
“The situation in Bila Tserkva and Brovary, where people are left without electricity for several days at a time, is completely unacceptable,” Zelenskyy said in his evening address. He added that he had had a “harsh conversation with government officials” during a conference call.
The president insisted that problems with electricity supplies should be resolved rather than concealed through inaccurate reports. He did not name specific officials whom he considered responsible for the discrepancy between the reports and the actual situation.
New mechanisms for cooperation with municipalities being prepared
Earlier in the day, Zelenskyy described the pace of recovery of Ukraine’s energy sector as too slow. He instructed the Ministry of Digital Transformation, the Ministry of Energy, and the Ministry for Communities and Territories Development to prepare additional mechanisms for cooperation with cities and municipalities.
The aim is to accelerate recovery efforts and make information from populated areas more accurate. In practice, this means that the central authorities will receive timely data on the actual duration of outages and progress on repairing damaged infrastructure.
Ukraine continues to restore its energy system following Russian strikes on the electricity transmission and distribution network. Against this backdrop, the president emphasized not only the speed of repairs, but also the reliability of the reports on which decisions about aid and the allocation of resources are based.
Sources: epravda.com.ua, president.gov.ua