Panchenko demands that the mayor deal with Sviatelyk: «If a person works well, you don't hear about them and there are no problems»

Fedir Panchenko, deputy from the Propozytsia party. Photo: NikVesti

The head of the deputy commission, Fedir Panchenko, criticised the work of the finance department and its head, Vira Sviatelyk, over the situation with monthly spending limits for the culture department.

This was discussed during a meeting of the Mykolaiv City Council's budget commission on 13 February, according to NikVesti.

During the discussion of the issue, it became clear that the city's culture department is short of more than 5 million hryvnias to pay salaries. According to the head of the department, Yurii Liubarov, they submitted a request for 6.3 million hryvnias for February, but the finance department approved only 4.5 million hryvnias.

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Commission member Oleksandr Bereza noted that the redistribution of budget limits is a technical issue and should be resolved at the level of the finance department or at a meeting chaired by the mayor, rather than by the commission without a complete picture of the budget.

«There should be an appeal from the finance department. If the finance department cannot resolve this on its own, a meeting chaired by the mayor should be convened to reach a decision. What can we decide if we do not have a complete picture of the entire budget?» he said.

Committee Chairman Fedir Panchenko noted that the effective work of officials should be invisible to the deputy corps, and the finance department should resolve the issue of budget limits on its own.

«As I see it, if a person works well, then nothing is heard about them. This sometimes plays a cruel joke on a person, but no problems arise. If problems arise that then need to be resolved at the level of the city council, the mayor, and so on, then this is already a secondary issue. First, resolve this issue, and second, why it had to be resolved by the commission manually. To do this, we will need to request information (regarding budget limits, — note), study it, review it, and draw our own conclusions about how we evaluate such work,» said Fedir Panchenko.

He stressed that the commission's intervention indicates malfunctions within the system and proposed initiating an internal official investigation into the causes of the situation.

«For me personally, this is a signal that something is not working properly within the system. My proposal is to make a recommendation to the mayor: an internal official investigation into the reasons why this situation arose, why the deputy corps had to intervene and why it became a public issue. And to draw the appropriate conclusions. This should have been resolved without us and a long time ago,» he said.

Fedir Panchenko also noted that Mayor Oleksandr Sienkevych should competently investigate the situation.

«We believe in the competence of Oleksandr Fedorovych (Mayor Oleksandr Sienkevych, — note). Oleksandr Fedorovych must competently investigate who did not reach whom,» added Fedir Panchenko.

To rectify the situation with salaries for cultural workers, the members of the commission requested a detailed monthly breakdown of funding for all administrators and recommended that Mayor Oleksandr Sienkevych, together with the finance department, adjust it to ensure the timely payment of salaries guaranteed by law in February and March.

We will remind you that at a session in December last year, the head of the Mykolaiv City Council's planning and budget commission, Fedir Panchenko, accused the director of the city council's finance department, Vira Sviatelyk, of mistakes in planning the budget for 2025, as a result of which the city did not have enough funds to pay salaries to employees at the end of the year.

As is known, in early November 2025, the main administrators of funds, as well as municipal enterprises in Mykolaiv, were instructed to suspend all payments for expenses not related to protected items, namely salaries of budgetary employees and payments for utilities.

In turn, the mayor of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Sienkevych, stated that he sees no fault in the actions of the director of the city council's finance department, Vira Sviatelyk, and considers Fedir Panchenko's criticism of her to be misguided. In addition, Oleksandr Sienkevych noted that Vira Sviatelyk is checking to ensure that the budget is balanced and pointed out that there was a shortage of funds both last year and this year.