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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
🔍🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡War over the audit of “Lisiv Ukrayiny” (Forests of Ukraine)
The state enterprise with 29,9 billion UAH in revenue, which will become a joint-stock company. And two teams, each with their own deputies, media, and skeletons in the closet. We unpack...
Dismissed upward
On 6 May the Cabinet dismisses Ihor Zubovych from the position of Deputy Minister of Economy, and this is part of the personnel package the president himself announced. It would seem like the end of a career. But two days later Zubovych becomes the chief operating officer of “Lisiv Ukrayiny” and chair of the corporatization commission. The State Forest Resources Agency, headed by Viktor Smal, signs the dismissal order.
A bonus for the road
In June CEO Yurii Bolokhovets is credited with 9,2 million UAH for one month. Of that, 7,68 million was a bonus “for performance.” On 30 June he leaves the post. A year earlier the State Bureau of Investigations detained Bolokhovets on suspicion of illegal enrichment. The investigation calculated 10,4 million UAH in assets, and income was lacking for 7,9 million of them. The charge was later dropped, but not because a court believed the explanations. The reason was different: during the announcement of the search warrant no one turned on the recorder. NABU continues its investigation.
On 📌 1 July Zubovych takes the chair as acting CEO. The same day the Cabinet suspends Smal, that is, the person whose agency had appointed Zubovych two months earlier. The government gave no reasons. There is still no result of the disciplinary proceedings. It turns out that the one who opened the door was the first to be thrown out of it.
📖 Smal began his career as an aide to Member of Parliament Mykhailo Volynets. According to journalists, Bolokhovets lived free of charge in an apartment in the “Boulevard of Fountains.” The owner of the apartment is Andrii Reva, co-founder of the family agribusinesses of the Bolokhovets family, where his mother and wife run things. Bolokhovets himself insists the family rents the apartment at market price. Volynets had the same apartment. Smal’s first boss and his boss at the agency ended up in the same residential complex. A forest vertical with a view of the fountains.
⚙️Who will audit the auditor
The new team promises an audit. How the old one worked has already been partially shown by the State Audit Service. The state enterprise’s branches signed contracts for work worth about 10 billion UAH. Twelve firms linked to Cherkasy businessman Babenko received over 450 million UAH from them. Eleven of the twelve could not be found at their registered addresses. One firm with one employee reported 2,4 million planted trees, although by the norm that volume would require 168 people.
Now about the one who will check. In 2016 Zubovych’s declarations listed three BMWs, while the family’s income was about 82 thousand UAH per year. His successor at the State Environmental Inspectorate, Subbotenko, whom people call Zubovych’s protégé, explained to NACP the origin of 653 thousand dollars like this: he found it in his late grandmother’s garage. Meanwhile the acting official who checks predecessors could himself be a candidate for the permanent post. In that case the audit turns into an election platform.
🚫A general in the forest
In June the state enterprise appointed an advisor “for coordination and control,” police Major General Oleh Salo. At the end of 2013 year, under Yanukovych, he led the Lviv Regional State Administration. MP Olha Vasylevska-Smagliuk called him a future “watcher.” In 20 October the Lviv Regional Council adopted an appeal to the government saying “People like Oleh Salo have no place in the state enterprise.” Among the regional council members is Anatolii Deineka, who since 2005 has headed Lviv region’s forests. His son holds the position of deputy director of the Carpathian Forest Office of the state enterprise. Who initiated the appeal is not specified in official documents.
🧠 There are no reformers and no victims in this story. The stake of the game is a company with 6,9 billion UAH in net profit per year precisely at the moment it is transformed into a joint-stock company. So the winner will not be the more honest one, but the one who holds the keys when the state enterprise becomes a joint-stock company.
All persons mentioned have the right to the presumption of innocence. Assessments by deputies and journalists are presented as their assertions.
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