In 1994 Oleksandr Popov won the election of the mayor of Komsomolsk (in 2016, the town was renamed Horishni Plavni) of the Poltava region.

In 2007, he headed the Ministry of Housing and Utilities in the government of Mykola Azarov, and held this position for seven months.

Parliament acquiesced, and mayor Leonid Chernovetskyi was dismissed from the state administration and replaced with presidential appointee Popov.

[5][nb 1] Among his merits as the head of the Kyiv City State Administration, Popov listed the opening of five new metro stations, two museums and one library, the construction of road junctions, the launch of a city train, the repair of five schools and 30 kindergartens.

[8] The same day the General Prosecutor of Ukraine's Office handed "a notification on suspicion of abuse of power when ordering the Euromaidan police actions of 30 November 2013" out to Popov[8] and Anatoliy Holubchenko was appointed as acting Head of Kyiv City Administration.

[10] In the 2019 Ukrainian parliamentary election Popov was a self-nominated candidate in Kyiv's electoral constituency 212 (located in Darnytskyi District).

Popov will supply heat energy to the surgical and children's buildings of the intensive care hospital in Horishni Plavni.