On October 26, 2023, the administrative board of the Western interregional territorial branch of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine decided to recognize certain actions of the executive committee of the Mykolaiv City Council (Lviv region) as a violation of the legislation on the protection of economic competition.
The violation was discovered as a result of the Department’s monitoring of compliance with the requirements of the legislation on the protection of economic competition by local self-government bodies and business entities operating on regional markets in the field of water supply and drainage in the city of Mykolaiv, Stryi district, Lviv region. In particular, the Department established that the executive committee of the Mykolaiv City Council adopted decision No. 11 dated 11.02.2020 “On the issuance of technical conditions for joining the centralized water supply and drainage networks”, which established: “…the obligation of the Mykolaivvodokanal MEC to issue technical conditions to physical and legal entities to join the centralized water supply and drainage networks based on the relevant decision of the executive committee of the Mykolaiv City Council…”.
Such actions of the executive committee of the Mykolaiv City Council led to the extension of the deadline for the municipal utility company “Mykolaivvodokanal” to issue technical conditions for joining the centralized water supply and/or centralized water drainage networks for more than ten working days after receiving the approval of the executive committee of the Mykolaiv City Council. This is not foreseen by the current legislation of Ukraine.
The administrative board of the Western MTV recognized the above-mentioned actions of the defendant as a violation of the legislation on the protection of economic competition, namely, the creation by local self-government bodies of conditions for business entities to commit violations of the legislation on the protection of economic competition.
It is worth noting that the VC of the Mykolaiv City Council made changes to decision No. 11 dated February 11, 2020, which terminated the identified violation.