Pivdenne Mayor Dismisses Deputy for Joining Armed Forces of Ukraine

The mayor of Pivdenne, Volodymyr Novatsky, dismissed his deputy Leonid Neykov because he joined the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

This was reported by the press service of the city council.

Prior to mobilization, Leonid Neykov served as deputy mayor for executive bodies and head of the department of legal support and interaction with government agencies of the Pivdenne City Council.

"Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, Leonid Neykov has been constantly helping the army both as an official and as a private citizen," the municipality emphasized.

Leonid Neykov was not the first deputy mayor in Odesa region to join the Armed Forces. In January 2024, the first deputy mayor of Teplodar in Odesa Oblast , Andriy Makovetskyi, did the same .

In November 2023, two officials were removed from the executive committee in Odesa: former Deputy Mayor Hennadii Trukhanov, Dmytro Zheman, and First Deputy Mayor Serhii Tetiukhin. As it became known during the session, Serhiy Tetyukhin joined the Armed Forces of Ukraine. He was later killed in a missile attack on Odesa on March 15, 2024.

In October 2023, Deputy Mayor Oleh Bryndak was dismissed from his position as vice mayor until the day he was actually discharged from military service. At the time, he was suspected of participating in a criminal organization that, according to investigators, acted in the interests of businessman Volodymyr Halanternyk.

Also in the summer of 2024, the Center for Public Investigations asked the Odesa City Council about the number of mobilized deputies and was informed that there were three. In addition to Oleh Bryndak, who was also a deputy, it is known that in 2022 other members of the city council also reported joining the war. This includes Ihor Batrakov, who posted on Facebook on March 4 that he had joined the Odesa police. Deputy Serhiy Uzunov has also been serving in the National Police since March 2022.

Also, MPs Dmytro Tantsiura and Oleksandr Sheremet reportedly joined the territorial defense forces .

However, it should be noted that these deputies do not attend all committee meetings, but attend plenary sessions. That is, they did not resign from the city council.

Кирило Бойко