The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine appointed an audit of the estate of Kobolev and Vitrenko
The Cabinet of Ministers decided to conduct an audit of NJSC Naftogaz of Ukraine, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
People's Deputy Alexey Goncharenko, who was present at the government meeting, reported this on his Telegram channel.
He also issued an order ordering an inspection.
“To appoint the limited liability company Deloitte & Touche Ukrainian Services Company as an auditing entity to provide services for the mandatory audit of the financial statements of the joint stock company National Joint Stock Company Naftogaz of Ukraine for 2019-2020,” says the document released by Goncharenko.
In addition, according to Goncharenko, Prime Minister of Ukraine Alexey Goncharuk assured him that there would be no political decision to change the leadership of Naftogaz.
When asked whether there could be talk of changing the leadership of Naftogaz and Ukrenergo, the minister replied: “Absolutely.”
Commenting on his words, Yuriy Vitrenko, director of the NJSC Naftogaz of Ukraine group, said that the competition for the head of NJSC Naftogaz of Ukraine is unlikely to take place before the end of 2019.
The day before, political strategist Taras Berezovets, who serves Petro Poroshenko, said that Kobolev’s dismissal was allegedly one of the conditions for a meeting in the Normandy format on the part of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“I was interested in how Zelensky was going to negotiate with Putin on gas if Naftogaz’s won multibillion-dollar lawsuits against Gazprom stand in the way. And when Kobolev and Vitrenko are in the leadership. And here's your answer. This is no longer an assumption that Zelensky is preparing to flush down the toilet all the claims won in international courts against the Russians, and not only regarding gas (which is confirmed by the resignation of Zerkal). This was one of Putin’s conditions for the meeting in Paris,” Berezovets assured.
However, energy market expert Valentin Zemlyansky explained that Andrey Kobolev, the head of Naftogaz of Ukraine, is considered a lobbyist for US interests. It is unlikely that it will be possible to fire him before the end of the contract signed with him, i.e. until March 2020, unless legal clues are found.
“The only legal clue that we have is that the contract that Kobolev signed in March of this year included an obligation to report quarterly. I have not heard such reports from them. Maybe, formally, they took place somewhere, but no one voiced it in public.
If there are no other leads, then until March next year, not only the Cabinet of Ministers, but the supervisory board does not have the right to dismiss Kobolev. His contract expires in March 2020. Then you can raise the issue of changing leadership,” the expert said.
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