In the Office of the President of Ukraine, a preparatory meeting of the Presidium of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities was held, at which the payment of aid to businesses and people who may suffer losses as a result of the tightening of quarantine restrictions was discussed
due to the spread of the coronavirus.
The meeting was held in the format of a video conference with the participation of the head of the Office of the Head of State Andriy Yermak, his deputies Kyril Tymoshenko and Yulia Svyridenko, Minister of Finance Serhii Marchenko, Minister of Health Maksym Stepanov, Minister of Community and Territorial Development Oleksiy Chernyshov and heads of regional state administrations, representatives of united territorial
communities and city mayors.
“I would like us to immediately start the work of our Congress with real decisions and results. That is, from the very beginning, I want to destroy the myth that all these institutions, all these organizations, which were created many times, were created only on paper and did not provide any movement or real solutions for our citizens. We want the creation of the Congress to really bring qualitative changes to all of us,” noted Andriy Yermak.
He reminded that the President has set a task in the coming years to improve the quality of life of citizens in the regions.
“The task is to fundamentally change Ukraine, to prove to every city or village that they have entrusted power to efficient and, importantly, honest people. To do this, we have to make the lives of our people better. This will lead Ukraine to the victory that we all want to see,” the head of the President’s Office emphasized.
3. In order to improve the standard of living of people in the regions, the Congress of local and regional authorities was recently established by the decree of Volodymyr Zelensky, which will coordinate the cooperation of the central and local authorities.
“As the President says, the central and local authorities are not competitors, not rivals, but first of all partners. Therefore, we will reject everything that prevents us from working normally and moving forward,” Andriy Yermak said.
He added: “The uniqueness of our Congress is that this platform makes it possible to take into account the interests of all participants – from a big city to small towns, to have a direct dialogue, without intermediaries, and to develop solutions that will be in the interests of all citizens of our country. It is very important”.
The head of the President’s Office said that one of the main issues of today’s meeting is the discussion of the mechanism of joint support of local businesses in the context of the introduction of additional quarantine restrictions.
“Everyone understands how difficult it is for business today, and the President insists that now, in difficult times, support for entrepreneurs is insufficient. Therefore, together with representatives of local authorities, we should strengthen this support to simplify people’s lives,” Andriy Yermak said.
Deputy Head of the Office of the President, Executive Secretary of the Presidium of the Congress Kyrylo Tymoshenko emphasized the need to develop joint measures of state authorities and local governments to support business in quarantine conditions, because several regions of Ukraine are already in the “red” zone, and soon people will need help.
According to Yulia Svyridenko, a mechanism that has already demonstrated its effectiveness in December 2020 can be used to support small and micro businesses and employees of enterprises whose activities will be suspended due to the strengthening of the quarantine.
“There will be an opportunity to submit an application on the public services portal “Diya” and be guaranteed to receive a payment of 8,000 hryvnias from the state budget,” she said.
In addition, local authorities will be able to add funds from the local budget to the amount of state aid, thus increasing the total amount of material aid per person.
The representatives of the local authorities generally supported the initiative regarding compensation to entrepreneurs, while noting that the OTGs have different capabilities and already formed budgets.
“I think that our mayors will support this initiative. It is good, because we will pay people who in the “red” zone lose the opportunity to earn money”, – noted the head of the Ternopil Regional State Administration, Volodymyr Trush.
It was also noted that a meeting of the Congress under the chairmanship of President Volodymyr Zelenskyi is planned for May.
