Inspection of housing after shelling in Mykolaiv region is delayed — ombudsman

In Mykolaiv region, participants of the «eVidnovlennia» programme continue to face systemic delays and confusion with documents.

Spartak Hukasian, a representative of the Human Rights Ombudsman, told NikVesti that most of the appeals concern the long wait for an examination.

According to him, people wait for months for the commissions to arrive. And when the experts finally record the damage, the documents are often returned for revision due to formal inaccuracies.

«We consider the failure to meet reasonable deadlines to be the main violation. The right to housing restoration is also the right not to wait for this restoration indefinitely. When a person cannot even receive a survey report for six months due to organisational problems in the community, this is a direct violation of their rights. You can submit an application, but waiting for the commission to arrive and the documents to be properly executed is the main «traffic jam», says Spartak Hukasian.

The situation is particularly painful for the elderly and people with limited mobility. Formally, they can submit documents through the ASC, but in many communities there is virtually no assistance with the paperwork, which puts such applicants in an unequal position.

«Appeals regarding delays are the absolute leader among all complaints. As for refusals, they are received less frequently, but they are often caused by technical errors in the preparation of documents, which, in fact, is also a consequence of the imperfection of the procedure. When a person has gone through all the waiting circles and is denied because of an incorrectly filled-in column in the act, it causes just indignation,» says the Commissioner.

The subjectivity of damage assessment also remains a problem. Spartak Gukasyan says that there are cases when different commissions determine the extent of damage in different ways.

«The lack of a flexible mechanism for adjusting the maximum compensation amounts and a single, highly detailed assessment standard leads to an uneven approach and, as a result, to appeals to us,» he adds.

Since 10 May 2023, Ukraine has had a compensation programme for damaged housing «eVidnovlennia».

In Mykolaiv region, the programme «eVidnovlennia» 6834 families will receive financial compensation for damaged housing, and another 1381 owners of completely destroyed apartments and houses will receive certificates for their purchase.

Since the start of the programme, 10,530 applications for compensation for damaged property have been submitted in Mykolaiv region. Commissions have already approved 745.9 million hryvnias for 6,834 applicants.

In particular:

• 6249 homeowners have already received the first payment of almost 509 million hryvnias.

• 605 people have received the second payment of over 65.9 million hryvnias (category B repairs, maximum compensation amount is 500,000 hryvnias; the first payment is 70%, the second — 30% after the first payment is used).

Regarding completely destroyed property:

• The total number of applications for housing purchase for compensation is 2017.

• 1381 owners received housing certificates for a total amount of over 1.7 billion hryvnias.

• Another 22 citizens received cash compensation for the construction of housing worth over 32 million hryvnias.

It was reported that rural residents of Mykolaiv region who receive funds for destroyed houses often leave their settlements and buy housing in cities or other regions.