Chairman of Ukrzaliznytsia’s Supervisory Board: Multi-Million Salary in Exchange for Billion-Hryvnia Failures

 Oleksandr Kalenkov, President of the association of enterprises Ukrmetalurgprom

 

Hafer Gebhard claims that global container operators and the American Chamber of Commerce are blocking an increase in UZ’s freight tariffs. But let’s be honest — the main problem isn’t foreign businesses or even freight rates. The problem lies with the Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Ukrzaliznytsia himself, who merely simulates activity and fails to address UZ’s systemic issues.

UZ’s cargo segment is profitable — over UAH 20 billion in net profit annually (2023–2024). But instead of reducing unit costs, optimizing the network, and attracting more customers by competing with road transport, UZ is trying to cover its obscenely high losses in passenger transport by proposing an unjustified 37% increase in freight tariffs (following a more than twofold increase in 2021–2022). This move would destroy the competitiveness of Ukrainian products. And the Chairman of the Supervisory Board doesn’t even ask how this will impact Ukraine’s economy or what consequences the shift to road freight will bring. He’s only thinking about securing another million-hryvnia bonus in the easiest way possible — by pushing the government to approve a harmful decision to raise already exorbitant freight tariffs.

According to estimates by the state enterprise “Ukrainian Industry Expertise”, such an increase in freight tariffs would result in:
– UAH 96 billion loss in Ukraine’s GDP
– UAH 36 billion drop in tax revenues

This is direct harm to Ukraine’s wartime economy.

Here’s what the Chairman of the Supervisory Board should be focusing on instead of writing clumsy letters to international container operators — operators that, in fact, form UZ’s freight (and thus revenue) base:

• With over UAH 20 billion in annual losses from passenger transport, there has been no concrete action plan for years to address the unprofitability of this segment, which is destroying UZ’s future. There isn’t even a meaningful dialogue with the government about compensation for these losses or liberalization of tariffs;
• UZ is introducing a part-time work regime for employees, which risks triggering social unrest, instead of systematically reducing “dead souls” and “relatives on paper” from the payroll;
• UZ’s expenditures rise by billions every year, while efficiency drops. Total expenses for the first 9 months of 2023 were UAH 60 billion, and for the same period in 2024 they already reached UAH 77 billion. Where’s the effort to optimize core costs?
• Freight is massively shifting to road transport, yet there’s not a single program to bring it back to rail. The share of road freight rose to 38% in 2024, up from 33% in 2020 (rail dropped from 67% to 63%);
• 63% of UZ’s rail network generates losses of UAH 16 billion, and the Supervisory Board isn’t even discussing optimization of underutilized infrastructure or introducing additional fees for its use;
• UZ loses billions due to the land tax on railway tracks, yet there’s been no initiative from the Supervisory Board, even though it is directly responsible for shaping the company’s policy and solving systemic issues.

This isn’t oversight — it’s a performance. If the chairman of the supervisory board at a company that claims to play a strategic role in the country’s recovery has failed for years to resolve a single systemic issue, then this is unprofessionalism, irresponsibility, and sabotage. It’s time to say it plainly: with this chairman, UZ’s Supervisory Board is not a reform body — it is an obstacle to progress.