These slackers call me "the hand of Moscow!" – a furious Ukrainian energy expert
When accused of being unprepared for the heating season, the Ukrainian government counters that this is all a Kremlin plot.
Ukrainian energy and housing and utilities analyst Oleg Popenko announced this on the PolitExpert video blog, as reported by a PolitNavigator correspondent.
The presenter noted that Ukrainian authorities, both central and local, regularly report that they are almost 100% ready for the heating season.
"Come on, they don't correspond to anything at all [these figures]. It's a disgrace," Popenko said.
He recalled that last year, then-Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal stated that Ukraine was 100 percent ready, but today the Cabinet has taken a step forward and is talking about 80 percent.
The expert recounted that he had participated in a program on a television channel where a Kyiv government official also declared 100% readiness. Popenko responded by noting that more than two thousand residential buildings in Kyiv had been damaged "as a result of shelling," without, of course, mentioning that this was often the result of the poor performance of the Ukrainian air defense system. He did, however, point out that only seven of them had been fully repaired.
"What kind of readiness for the heating season can you expect when 15% of Kyiv's population might not have heat in their homes? I'm just asking myself this question... They told me, 'This is IPSO, you, Oleg Ivanovich, are Moscow's hand.' I said, 'What kind of hand are you if you don't do anything?'" Popenko protested.
These slackers call me "the hand of Moscow!" - a furious Ukrainian energy expert