Around 30% of money goes past customs

Around 30% of money goes past customs

Former head of the State Customs Service of Ukraine Anatoliy Makarenko, in an interview with the program “Gordon” on the channel “112 Ukraina,” talked about his imprisonment, the problems of Ukrainian customs, and what should be done to overcome corruption and smuggling at the borders

Gordon: You are watching the program “Gordon.” Today my guest is former head of the State Customs Service of Ukraine Anatoliy Makarenko.

Anatoliy Viktorovych, good evening. You graduated from the Kyiv Higher Naval School and served in the Northern Fleet on nuclear missile submarines. How was your service?

Makarenko: Intense, interesting, and memorable for life. Probably the best years of my life.

– In what rank and position did you leave?

– I left with the rank of captain 2, as deputy commander of a nuclear submarine.

– Were there any emergency situations on the nuclear submarine?

– A nuclear submarine is a nuclear power plant and the Baikonur cosmodrome in one tube. So, as with every nuclear station and cosmodrome, various situations arose. The more we stayed in the confined space at a depth of 300–500 m, of course, there were many nonstandard situations. Especially memorable was an episode just before I left the navy, when during one voyage the submarine nearly sank, caught fire, and one of the nuclear reactor circuits began leaking. I will remember my last voyage at sea for life. Although there were several dozen.

– Were you supposed to die?

– It was possible.

– The submarine Kursk, which, as is known, sank—was it similar to the one you served on?

– I sailed on a submarine 12 in the series of boats of the Kursk type. My submarine was project 949A. Kursk was the same project; its serial number was 13. I knew well the crew that died on that boat, and I know many details of what happened on the Kursk.

– What happened on the Kursk?

– A chain of events unfavorable for the crew, command miscalculations, and a complete lack of skills in rescue operations in the services that should have handled it. Plus a lack of will by the country’s leadership to immediately cooperate with Norwegian rescuers and rescuers from other countries. Time was wasted, people were lost.

– When the Kursk died, did you cry?

– Yes. Many of those guys died there—people I started serving with and trained with at the center. My crew was formed about six months before Kursk’s crew was formed. I could have become the deputy commander of that submarine.

– You headed the State Customs Service of Ukraine twice: from 2009 to 2010 and from 2014 to 2015. Many cosmonauts told me their favorite film is White Sun of the Desert. Did you like Motyl’s White Sun of the Desert?

– It’s one of my favorite films. That was even before customs.

– What do smugglers bring into Ukraine most today?

– Smugglers bring into Ukraine whatever is profitable to sell here: from women’s underwear to weapons and drugs. The most profitable contraband exported from Ukraine is cigarettes, because the production cost of a pack in Ukraine differs from prices on Europe’s shadow markets. Into Ukraine, contraband mostly brings consumer goods: electronics, food, high-liquidity items. Most likely this is the consumer goods segment.

– Approximately what volume of money goes past the budget through customs?

– About 30% goes past customs. These are huge sums. Tens of billions of hryvnias and billions of dollars.

– Who runs customs today? I mean, who really controls it?

– Customs is not being governed today. Ukrainian customs resembles a child cared for by seven nannies, but the child belongs to no one—neglected and abandoned. So in fact there is no proper, adequate management system over Ukraine’s customs today. There is a system of certain “watchers”; local elites try to influence this or that customs post, semi-criminal elements, and certain characters from the parliamentary corps. So today Ukrainian customs is going through a very alarming, very difficult time. Possibly one of the most complex stages of its development.

– Who feeds off customs?

– Once during a big meeting I drew a circle—a honey cake—showing who feeds off customs. I tried to explain that customs officers themselves receive about 15% of that honey cake, and the rest of the feeding troughs are split among the law enforcement agencies starting with the respected SBU, etc. I went around the circle and showed in percentages who cuts that corrupt pie today.

– Are you talking about the presidential meeting dedicated to the fight against smuggling?

– That was mentioned there, too.

– The president asked you, when you headed customs, what prevented you from being effective? Or what did he ask?

– Who is involved in smuggling? Who covers it? The president didn’t say it outright, but that was implied. Respected heads of the country’s law enforcement agencies were in the hall. I said: “All the participants of the regatta are in this hall.”

– Were they immediately arrested?

– I was dismissed some time later.

– I know a very colorful person—Hennadiy Hennadiyovych Moskal. I know you once had a colorful conversation with him. What was it about?

– Hennadiy Hennadiyovych was governor of Luhansk region. There was a situation when cellulose could not be delivered to one factory because the SBU blocked the shipment on an utterly contrived pretext. The governor misunderstood the situation a bit, decided customs had done it, called me via helicopter and in his manner expressed complaints. When I replied to him in a naval manner, Hennadiy Hennadiyovych said: “Oh, you understand me, you’re a smart fellow, we’ll sort it out.” I maintain close relations with Hennadiy Hennadiyovych now; I consider him a strong and worthy person.

– Did serious people often try to pressure you?

– At first, in 2009, yes. At the very beginning of my major customs career. In 2014, no longer.

– How did that happen? Did they call you, meet you?

– There were threats and calls of a serious level. But in 2009–2010 there was a prime minister who understood the situation and really supported us. When the former president, with whom I also now maintain very good relations, came to remove me from office at a prosecutor’s collegium, your humble servant spoke there, after which it was said: “Who is removing whom?” And we changed the format, so to speak. Pressure came from the highest echelons down to criminal elements. We went through it; it’s history now.

– Did bandits come?

– They did.

– Did they speak directly?

– It varied. In 2014, our “specialists” already came camouflaged. These are the so-called “heroes” of Maidan who began engaging in various contraband schemes. I invited the most active ones to my office, poured a glass of brandy, we talked, and they said there were essentially no more issues.

– Did many scars remain on your heart after all these hardships? It’s nerve-wracking work to run customs, and twice at that.

– Ilya Mykolayovych Yemets, the cardiac surgeon, knows. It’s a difficult job if you try to do it honestly and professionally.

– Did you learn to refuse?

– Yes, I often refused.

– Was your soul unsettled by frequent attacks?

– No. After the well-known story of gas formalization and the powerful pressure from the security services in the first half of 2009, the fear went away.

– The largest bribe you were offered?

– Three million dollars. The money was offered for appointing a scoundrel to a position. Thank God that scoundrel never surfaced later.

– And if the money had been offered to appoint a good person?

– I would not have taken it. Never. I consider it shameful and worthless to take dirty money for appointing people to positions.

– Under Yanukovych you were imprisoned. For what?

– The gas documentation story. The well-known gas contract—absolutely transparent and clear—had all the necessary documents submitted for customs clearance. Yes, there were problems with transfer of ownership between NAK Naftogaz and the legendary Rosukrenergo. But ownership issues are not matters of customs control and clearance. If customs receive all required documents, customs has two paths: accept for clearance, and if something is missing, refuse clearance. In our situation there were no grounds to refuse clearance. If we had refused then, we would have been the ones sent to prison.

– So you were jailed because of arbitrariness?

– Imprisoned because of arbitrariness.

– Did they demand you to give someone up?

– Yes, Tymoshenko. They wrote 14 points that I had to fulfill to be released.

– And you?

– I told them to go to hell.

– Didn’t you want to get out?

– I wanted to, but I made my decision. My family supported me. I decided quickly and never regretted it.

– Did Yulia Volodymyrivna find out about it?

– Yes, she knows about it.

– What conversation did you have after prison? Was there one at all?

– Yes. Literally three days after her release, in her office, when we hugged. She smelled the same smell I had after my prison— the musty smell of hopelessness. Even the golden cage they say she had is still a prison. That smell was palpable; I remember it forever.

– How was it to sit?

– When I ended up in the death-row cell (from which people were led to the firing squad when there were such articles), and they first held me there (now it’s a cell for life prisoners), the first hours were hard. Then I shifted my mindset and said: “Anatoliy, you were on a submarine in confined space. Consider this autonomous duty.” I lost 15 kg in a month to a month and a half. When my wife saw me after 2 months, she said: “We don’t need you like this. You were always strong. Recover.” I changed my attitude toward prison and decided it would not break me; I would break the prison. As Brodsky said: lack of space is compensated by excess time. There is a lot of time—read, do sports, think, write.

– Did you pity yourself?

– No. Not once.

– Did you never cry in prison?

– I think the first time was when I met my wife. I was ashamed before her. I worried that it was very hard for her. I worried that I had let her down.

– Were you humiliated?

– No. Once they tried— a strip-search with undressing. But it didn’t happen. Serhiy Starenkyi, the former head of the pretrial detention center, knows about it and acted very dignifiedly. He gave the necessary orders. I wouldn’t have allowed it; I would have fought.

– How did the criminal world treat you?

– Respectfully. We had contacts in the second stage of the prison. The convict world calls law enforcement “the colored ones.” As one former prisoner said, “when ‘colored’ Makarenko entered, the thieves stood up.” You had to position yourself, because they had drawn me for 8–10 years, and I had to prepare to serve a long time in those conditions. You needed to fix your name, your position.

– I saw absolutely terrible photos from Lukyanivska prison. In my opinion, it is inhumane even to keep hardened criminals in such conditions. Did you sit in such cells?

– I sat in different cells. One of the worst cells had walls facing the sunny side. It was summer, and it was awful. We constantly doused ourselves with water; air entered the cell through an open grate. Then they began to weld that grate shut. For two days we tried to get someone out—we had to sort out the situation. I made a stand, and they brought me to the head of the pretrial detention center, Serhiy Starenkyi. I said: “Why did you weld the cell? We are suffocating—the smoke was let in.” He said: “The SBU reported that there is a threat to your personal safety.” I said: “But by localizing this threat you are creating a threat to the lives of other cell residents.” Credit to Starenkyi: he made a decision and they unsealed us.

– Which known prisoners were next to you?

– Zvarych Ihor Stepanovych, Judge Zvarych. We were together in one cell near the end.

– Did you cross paths with Lutsenko?

– Once, when they brought us out for interrogations in different rooms. I was by then an experienced prisoner and had some influence. The convoy opened my door and then Yuriy Vitaliyovych’s. I ran in, hugged him, kissed Iryna—she was with him at the time.

– Have you kept good relations with him?

– Yes. Yuriy Vitaliyovych Lutsenko is my friend, and I am proud of that friendship; I value it highly.

– Did he serve with dignity?

– He served very with dignity.

– Now when you meet, do you recall prison?

– We recall it, but with an anecdote and a smile.

– Is it true that once Vakhtang Kikabidze came to visit you in prison?

– Yes. It’s true. Vakhtang Kostyantynovych came. The prison chief called me, trembling, and said Kikabidze wanted to meet me. But the prison chief told him that if he took me out of the cell to meet Kikabidze, he would have to take my place. He said: “Sorry, I couldn’t organize this meeting.” He handed me an icon from Kikabidze. It was very touching and lifelong. I bow to and love that man.

– How long did you spend behind bars?

– One year and 13 days.

– Was it time thrown away? Or did you gain something?

– If you put “thrown away” and “gained” on scales, I rather gained confidence. I believed in myself.

– Who personally is responsible for you ending up on the bunks?

– A group of young investigators who took the case and falsified it.

– But someone guided them?

– It was headed by SBU chief Valeriy Ivanovych Khoroshkovskyi.

– So it was his initiative?

– It’s hard for me to say. Most likely the initiative came from that circle we now call the Rosukrenergo group. It has gone into history. Back then it was a powerful grouping. So for a certain scheme to return their gas, arresting Makarenko and other customs officers was necessary. Of course they wanted to obtain testimony against Tymoshenko. That was needed by the political leadership. They returned the gas, but did not get testimonies.

– Was Khoroshkovskyi also your customs boss?

– Yes.

– Aren’t there some collegiate relations?

– Valeriy Ivanovych was a very powerful supervisor of customs. After my release from prison we met with him and understood each other; I have absolutely no claims against him. When we were clearing the gas, he told me: “Clear the gas—I will put you in prison.” I told him: “You know me: if NAK Naftogaz supplies all the documents for clearance, I will clear the gas.” He kept his word.

– You served a year and 13 days. Do you want to take revenge on anyone for that?

– No. I was offered to join revenge actions against Judge Tsarevych, who tried me. Judge Vovk tried me. Mykola Hrabyk, who was head of the investigative group and then head of the investigative group in Kharkiv regarding Tymoshenko. I was offered to play the revenge game. I refused. I don’t want to. But I remember them all.

– Many high-ranking people who later ended up in prison told me that investigators, trying to break them, would say: “You were somebody out there, and here you’re nobody.” Did they tell you that?

– Not once.

– Do you remember the day you got out of prison?

– Yes. I knew I wouldn’t get out soon. When they told me again that I had to go (during the year they took me out about 100 times for various interrogations), I said I agreed with the decision and would not go. But then an officer came and said I must go. I came, and that court released me. Completely unexpectedly. Although three months earlier they offered me release under certain conditions, leaving the customs inspector who processed the gas in prison. I said I would leave only with my inspector. And I was released the same day with him.

– Is it true you were released because someone very serious came to Yanukovych and said: “You must release Makarenko”?

– People gossip about that. I would like to find out, shake that person’s hand, but to this day I do not know.

– The European Court satisfied your suit against Ukraine for compensation for moral damage for your imprisonment—for being innocent. How much should they pay you and have they paid?

– Not paid yet. By court decision it’s 10 thousand euros. And if those funds are somehow credited to former defendant Makarenko, they will immediately go to the children of Ukraine. We help several families, and I know where that money will go.

– So the European Court recognized your imprisonment was unlawful?

– Yes. We achieved that. It took almost a seven-year cycle so that other obsequious investigators and operatives wouldn’t be tempted to do the same. The group of investigators received medals, apartments, early ranks for our case.

– What is happening today at the Ukrainian customs?

– Ukrainian customs has degraded. Ukrainian customs is unprofessional today. It is morally decayed and cannot guarantee the economic security of the state.

– Is that a verdict or can it be changed?

– Today that is a fact, and it’s impossible to rebuild anything within the current coordinates of the State Fiscal Service system. For two and a half years there has been no head at Ukrainian customs. The Vinnytsia head of the tax administration, who became acting deputy head of the SFS under Roman Nasirov, Prodan Myroslav, is acting head of the SFS today. At customs—acting, acting—the head has been absent for 2,5 years. The director of the Department of Organization of Customs Control (all departments have been killed, destroyed; 1–2 departments remain) resigned. Customs is decapitated. This situation obviously suits the “fixers,” the “watchers” who eat the honey cake and drink the economy’s blood. But this is abnormal for a country with such borders, such population, and such an economy.

– Is it true Ukrainian customs today treats Crimea as a foreign state?

– Yes. They process cargo customs declarations the same way, and they process passengers crossing the border the same way.

– Is that a disgrace?

– It’s abnormal.

– Is the ATO zone today a tasty piece for smugglers from both sides?

– Yes. Smuggling is an inapplicable word for the ATO zone because it is still our territory. But otherwise you cannot call it anything but illegal movement of goods. It’s internal smuggling. Today it’s a colossal problem and a huge shadow market.

– Participants in that market…

– Law enforcement structures. There is no customs service there because customs stands at the border of its country, not at the line of demarcation. Although such ideas were discussed, and I categorically, as deputy head of the SFS, said: “Are we going to recognize the sovereignty of these pseudo-republics?”.

– Participants told me billions of dollars circulate there.

– It’s true—huge sums.

– Do you think the war will end with such money on both sides? It benefits everyone involved.

– I am convinced that with political will from decision-makers this could all be solved very quickly.

– Who is the leader of smuggling in the country today?

– There are many smuggling entry points in Ukraine today. Odessa is a classic entry point and I think it was and remains a leader. But today customs control and clearance are so blurred that flow smuggling can be found where it never used to be—even in Sumy.

– Who covers smuggling today?

– Smuggling is accompanied by the same dealers as many years before. They haven’t changed. Smuggling is accompanied by the same law enforcement officers who constantly tried to escort it and with whom I always had difficult relations. I expelled them normatively, drove them out in various ways, pushed them out of customs control zones. Their effectiveness is 0,0. The theme is one—making corrupt money and crushing business.

– What do you think about “europlates” (cheap imported cars)?

– If a “europlate” tried to enter Ukraine in 2014, in my second term, I would have taken it apart bolt by bolt at the checkpoint. I would have invented a reason—and it would have rotted there. 1 500 bodies stood at my checkpoint in Volyn at the Yagodyn crossing. They couldn’t be brought in. There was no talk of the “plates.” They tried to bring separately the body and separately the kit (engines, chassis, etc.). I said: “Look for drugs.” They told me: “We can’t hold them anymore.” I said: “Then cut them up. Maybe they’re made of gold.” And the appetite to bring them in disappeared. So when people created that scheme and motivated corrupt SFS officials, the niche opened.

– Can customs work honestly at all? Are there precedents in the world where customs works honestly?

– All of Western Europe works honestly. The Baltics work honestly; Georgians work absolutely transparently and honestly.

– And we can? But we don’t want to yet?

– We can. Three absolutely simple conditions: change personnel policy (the purge must be total, powerful, and strong); keep experienced employees, return pseudo-lustrated specialists, because soon there will be no one to teach—clean out everyone who came from the side of “fixers,” “moneymakers,” as we call them, in uniform; give adequate pay. A Polish customs officer today receives a modest salary—1 000 euros. But it’s fixed, with a social package, plus merciless fight against corruption.

– How much does our customs officer get today?

– Today a young customs officer who has just arrived receives around 300 dollars.

– How much should he get to stop taking bribes?

– For a normal young person to come to the Kyiv customs, at least 700 dollars.

– Could there be a system where part of the salary comes as a percentage of intercepted cargo?

– It can and should. I always advocated such initiatives. Today 9 800 people work at Ukraine’s customs—that’s very few. We used to have 18 thousand people. Of them 9 800 (40%) were operational staff. These people must be given adequate pay, and above them put not a pseudo internal security service that now engages in corruption at the SFS (they are among today’s main corruptionists), remove law enforcement but place normal controllers. Not everything will stop immediately, but over time. The Poles went through this. They still change their customs officers into the pavement. It’s clear this will happen, but it will not be a complete hole in the border.

– So you believe Ukrainian customs can work transparently and honestly?

– Absolutely I believe it. Georgians managed it—why can’t we?

– I remember well how you were on Maidan during the hardest days when there was a real threat to life. You spent nights there. Would you have gone out to Maidan if you had known what it would lead to 4 years later?

– Thieves turned into traders. If I had known the thieves we fought on Maidan would become traders, I would probably have behaved a bit differently. But I would definitely have been on Maidan. I just wouldn’t have watched the Maidan stage with admiration.

– And you watched?

– Unfortunately, yes. I, beaten and toughened, with a conditional criminal record, living on Maidan, succumbed. I repent of that. I won’t succumb a second time. I’ll probably do something differently.

– Once you left my house at night with whole groups of reserve officers prepared for the worst and unpredictable events. Were you ready to die then?

– We went out the very night they began killing. We all had weapons. I managed to save all my people, but unfortunately what happened happened. But thank God none of those near me used their weapons.

– Is there more corruption now than under Yanukovych, in your view?

– It’s hard to assess whether corruption is more or less. I’ll say it has become massive, total, cynical, and bleak.

– Nasirov—hero or victim?

– For me, Roman Mykhailovych Nasirov is the person who finalized the destruction of Ukrainian customs.

– What is the principle today in appointing people to high positions in our country? Is it correct and what should it be, in your opinion?

– Pseudo-competitions, behind-the-scenes deals, worthless personnel decisions with rare exceptions. Return competent people, review the law on pseudo-lustration, and return to normal personnel policy. Bureaucratic nomenclature is grown over years, not taken from the air (fake reformers, etc.). Today, I believe we have completely lost personnel potential for growth.

– I admire your aphorisms you occasionally post on Facebook. I know you write poems. Let’s give our viewers a taste—some aphorism or poem.

– From unpublished aphorisms: “Don’t jail others, so that you yourself won’t be jailed.” And recently I wrote, watching FB chronicles, that “the news feed turns into a feed of hatreds.” Aphorisms are written by novelists who didn’t make it, idlers. And one poem from the navy I wrote to my wife: “One thing I ask: don’t put on those black pantyhose with bows. My dear, don’t forget, I serve on a nuclear submarine.” Yevgeny Oleksandrovych Yevtushenko, when he heard this, wrote me: “To the author of the immortal rhyme pantyhose–submarine, to talented poet Tolya Makarenko. With respect, Yevtushenko.” In 1990, on the eve of our independence, these words were born, now 28 years old: “I wish the country freedom, and to myself and you—everything in abundance, so that we win an independent, better part for our descendants. May we never be struck by a sorrowful, evil hour. May a cheerful, proud Ukraine always live in peace with everyone.”

– Anatoliy Viktorovych, thank you. If you ever run for president, I will vote for you.

Source: 112.ua