Friday, October 24, 2008

Bad news for Donbas

PoR leader Viktor Yanukovych has announced that the Mariupol Metallurgical Plant [Mariupolskiy met-kombinat im. Illicha], the largest in Ukraine, has stopped production.

The plant, a workers' collective, has about 60,000 employees on its books. They have been put on 'reduced wages'.

LEvko fears this is a significant indicator of the economic crisis facing the country - maybe the greatest in the country's short independent history. Wind-down and start up at plants such as MMK im. Illicha are major operations - they cannot be switched off and on at will. There could be a possibility now that it will never restart.

The value of last year's production at the plant was nearly 18 billion hryven.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I wonder if Yanuk will have to reduce or stop work on his HUGE mansion, "Mezhihirya," or if Yanuk and Akhmetov will have to cut back on their jets and limos and expensive vans and such.

Anonymous said...

The ongoing political crisis and destabilizing policies and actions of the Ukraine's President are not helping Ukraine's economy with stand the impact of the US generated world economic crisis.

Anonymous said...

After years of telling the people of "silly" Donbas that the Party of Regions "would make their life better," after years of the Party of Regions officials robbing the country blind like ungodly pigs, after Kuchma's daughter buys a $160 million mansion in Londongrad, after convincing the people of "silly" Donbas to vote for the Party of Regions so that rooshan could be an official state language - the Party of Region's operatives simply throw their loyal voters to the curb and put them out on the street without jobs - if they haven't already blown up in coal mines.

I wonder if the people of "silly" Donbas will finally realize how badly they have been hoodwinked by the Party of Regions.