The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine issued an order expanding the board of Ukrzaliznytsia (Ukrainian Railways) — two new members were added to it. The document appeared without public announcement or detailed explanation of the reasons.
UZ is the country's largest employer and critical wartime infrastructure: evacuation, front-line supplies, and grain exports flow through the railway. Every personnel decision in the board directly affects how this system functions.
The problem is not the expansion itself — collegial management can be more efficient. The problem is that the order does not contain publicly accessible information about the criteria by which candidates were selected, what their authority will be, and what the accountability system will look like. Appointments without a transparent competition in a state monopoly — this is not a personnel detail, it is a matter of managing a strategic asset.
In recent years, UZ has been under constant pressure for reforms: donors demand commercial efficiency, anti-corruption bodies demand transparency, and the military demands reliability. Expanding the board could be a step toward balanced management — or a tool for distributing influence within the state apparatus.
If the new board members went through competitive selection with clear KPIs — this is a step forward. But if the mechanism of their accountability remains as opaque as the appointment itself, should we expect this decision to have a real effect for passengers and shippers?
