Mustafa Nayyem, head of the State Agency for Reconstruction and Development of Infrastructure, has resigned. He explained his decision by the fact that systemic obstacles prevented him from effectively performing his duties. It seems that the conflict with the higher authorities has gone so far that the issue now looks like “either-or”.
The head of the State Agency himself decided not to follow the English way. He posted a meaningful post on Facebook explaining his position.
Main complaints, voiced by Nayyem, are:
- Irational reduction in the budget for road recovery, which will inevitably cause logistic difficulties for both the military and export of products abroad next year.
- An unprecedented level of bureaucracy related to the Agency. Approvals and permits for the allocation of funds take months, even for the construction of important military objects, which will soon cause a deterioration in the country’s defense. In the search for the guilty, Nayyem himself will become the first convenient option.
- The highly qualified staff of the structure had their salaries cut by 68%. If before the specialist received 30 thousand, now his salary has decreased to 14 thousand. This has led to the fact that 25% of the staff resigned, and it is impossible to find new specialized personnel with such a level of payment, because it does not at all correspond to the labor market.
As Nayyem told, his team repeatedly appealed to the authorities with their problems, but did not receive any reaction.
Since November 2023, his team has constantly faced resistance and artificial difficulties, particularly due to the fact that Prime Minister Denis Shmygal recalled him from the Conference on the Reconstruction of Ukraine in Berlin.
Despite the difficulties, the agency continues to work on 353 construction sites across the country. During the war, they managed to implement many projects, restoring almost 1.3 thousand km of roads and 330 bridges after the deoccupation of the affected regions. However, the protection of energy infrastructure remains a failure, despite significant budgets, and this happened under the direct leadership of Mustafa Nayyem, which should not be forgotten.
