Ternopil City Council withholds salaries from journalists so as to avoid "property based unrest"
The Ternopil City Council refused to list the officials' salaries to the journalists of the local media outlet "RIA+ / 20 Khvylyn", who had written to the City Council with a corresponding inquiry, reports the media outlet on their website.
The reason for the refusal was "preventing manipulation of public opinion and incitement to property- or social status-based unrest."
"Due to the Russian Federation's armed aggression against Ukraine and the introduction of martial law, in order to prevent manipulation of public opinion and incitement to property- or social status-based unrest, the processing of requests for public information of such content by the Ternopil City Council has been postponed. The processing of requests will be resumed after the martial law is lifted," reads the City Council's reply.
The media outlet notes that on October 6 they wrote to the City Council with an inquiry about regarding salaries, bonuses and other additional payments received by the Council's employees during the first year of the full-scale war. The City Council initially postponed the processing deadline for 20 days, which was reported to the editors. Later, they gave an answer, but the sums of salaries was never mentioned. In the response, the City Council also mentioned that processing such requests of this nature is currently suspended and "will be resumed after the martial law is lifted."
In turn, the outlet's journalists again anouther inquiry to the Ternopil City Council. At the same time, they are preparing an appeal to the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights together with a lawyer.
The outlet reminded that in October, the Ternopil Oblast Military Administration withheld salaries, bonuses and other payments to employees from them in 2022 as well.
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