“We felt political pressure and observed constant attempts to bypass the competition to appoint people whose professional qualities were doubtful to the Management Board of the Company,” they wrote. “We regularly received reports from the Company’s management during meetings about the negative impact on the Company’s reputation of anonymous sources in social media and pressure on employees from law enforcement agencies.”
Kudrytsky was dismissed from his role late Monday evening after the board, which is made up of three independent members and three state representatives, voted to end his tenure leading the country’s power grid. The network is facing a crisis as a result of Russian strikes on critical infrastructure.
In a missive released later Tuesday, Kudrytsky said he had called for a meeting of Ukraine’s parliament to dispute the decision, saying the stated reasoning — that he had failed to maintain the network’s security in the face of Moscow’s drones and missiles — was false.
“Recently, a campaign to discredit Ukrenergo was launched in anonymous Telegram channels and the mass media,” he said. “I asked the press service to collect these publications — a thick catalog of artificially spread, almost identical and unsubstantiated messages, aimed at destroying the company’s image, was the result.”
Despite that, Ukraine’s network is facing a dire situation. Speaking to POLITICO last week, Ukrainian Energy Minister German Galushchenko warned that his country is “really on the eve of probably the hardest winter in the history of the country” as a result of the power shortages. Ukraine’s allies have donated hundreds of millions of dollars worth of support for the energy system, which will come under strain as demand for heating and electricity rises in the colder months.
Ukraine’s Ministry of Energy did not immediately reply to a request for comment on Tuesday.