After having created a mess in the electricity market, President Zelenskyy’s Servant of the People party now appears intent on doing the same with the gas market. Faction leader David Arakhamia has proposed a law to “temporarily” prohibit private companies from selling gas at commercial market prices. Freeworld Forum’s Senior Fellow Anders Åslund writes about the consequences, for the Atlantic Council.
In effect, this would mean the restoration of disastrous post-Soviet policies of subsidization that reforms finally brought to an end in 2015-16. In that vein, Arakhamia claims that this gas can be used to the benefit of budget organizations, just as in the old Soviet days. He justifies this policy in populist fashion by positioning it as a blow against key oligarchs who produce gas in Ukraine.