You're reading: Is SBU using soldiers as a smokescreen?

The Security Service of Ukraine is vowing to give apartments to families of war veterans in a 13-building residential estate under construction in the Holosiivsky district of Kyiv.

However, the law enforcement agency cannot explain why most of the apartments will be sold at market rates. Such a practice would violate a law that requires the dwellings on government-donated land to be used only for veterans, or those qualifying for free housing.

As it turns out, only 327 apartments out of 3,269 will be owned by SBU employees who are also veterans of Russia’s war against Ukraine, according to the SBU official website.

The others are up for sale in what is called the Bergen complex after the city in Norway. Construction is set to be completed by 2019.

Ukraine’s Security Service, known as the SBU, controls the prime land plot situated near the city’s biggest park in the Holosiivsky district where the Bergen residential estate is being built.

It said that the apartments would be allotted to Donbas war veterans, families of slain soldiers, and relatives of those who “sacrificed their lives,” according to SBU spokeswoman Olena Hitlyanska. Those who “need to improve their living conditions” would also be accommodated, the SBU stipulated.

Construction ‘on hold’

Meanwhile, members of the local community have picketed the construction site. They believe the project is a threat to the nearby Holosiivsky National Park and that it will increase traffic in the area.
In response to their worries, in late December, Volodymyr Kiptenko, head of the SBU’s economic department, told the protesters that the construction would be “put on hold.”

But that didn’t happen.

Instead, during one of the latest protests on Jan. 20, hired thugs – known as “titushki” – were spotted near the construction site. They subsequently tried to disperse the protesters.
Construction company representatives said the strongmen had been hired to “check who’s behind the protesters.”

Hitlyanska said earlier that SBU officials would be prepared to meet with local residents to explain that they are going to provide social housing.

Uncon­vinced, the activists believe it’s all a scam.

One of them, Kyrylo Kyforuk, opposes the construction: “It’s another business project that uses servicemen as a smokescreen,” he told the Kyiv Post. “What angers me the most is that there are lots of ads about selling apartments and even a sales office (has opened).”

Indeed, there are numerous colorful billboards in the Holosiivsky district advertising apartments for sale in the residential complex for Hr 13,100 ($520) per square meter.

The SBU didn’t respond to emailed questions sent by the Kyiv Post by the time this issue of the newspaper went to press.

A billboard advertises apartments selling for $520 per square meter in a development that should go to Security Service of Ukraine employees who served as soldiers in war or their families. (Volodymyr Petrov

A billboard advertises apartments selling for $520 per square meter in a development that should go to Security Service of Ukraine employees who served as soldiers in war or their families. (Volodymyr Petrov)

SBU land

In November 2012 – almost one-and-a-half years before Russia started its war against Ukraine – the SBU obtained a project development permit from Kyiv City Council. Then the service got the green light to start construction from Ukraine’s former prime minister, Mykola Azarov, who issued a special decree in 2013.

According to the land cadastre, the land in question belongs to the SBU, but it also stipulates it can be used only for “defense purposes.” According to the law covering the use of such land, it can be used for building residential property, as long as it’s used by military personnel and their families, or used for social, or affordable housing. That means that it should be either given by the state for free under a long-term lease, or sold to young families who take out low-interest loans subsidized by the state. However, housing in the Bergen estate is being advertised for sale at market prices.

The SBU first announced a call for proposals to build the estate in February 2014. According to the bid specifications, the complex was to consist of thirteen 16-22-story buildings with a 91-space parking lot, a shopping mall, playgrounds and a kindergarten. According to documents published on the SBU website, at least 329 apartments, or 17,625 square meters, had to be given to the SBU.

Kyiv-based Arkada-Construction company initially won the bid and was obliged to provide 332 apartments to war veterans.

In August 2014, however, a new bid was announced – with no mention of the tender process starting – in a special section of the SBU’s website. The SBU later deleted information about the first winner from its website.

According to Arkada company lawyers, the company failed to agree on the terms for sharing the commissioning rights to the project with the SBU, which Arkada needed in order to sell mortgages for the property. The company then stopped working with the SBU.

A new winner – Housebuilding Company No. 7 – was announced after the SBU changed the details of the project in a way that made the deal much sweeter for the winner. The SBU decreased the minimum number of apartments it should get to 323, while removing any limitations on the number of floors of the buildings. Afterward, the winner said it would now build buildings ranging in height from 25 to 27 stories.

Company No. 7

In July, the building company’s head and former owner, Yuriy Chenchyk, told the Leviy Bereg website that Bergen is a “social, not a commercial project, so the apartments will not go on sale.”

But in an interview with the Kyiv Post on Jan. 27, the deputy head of Housebuilding Company No. 7, Yuriy Sokolnytsky, said this was not “precise information,” as a number of undisclosed investors are financing the project.

“The social focus of this project doesn’t mean that investors who are investing their money won’t get a profit – they will. But it can’t be a VIP project, it’s an economy class one, as some of the apartments will be given to SBU employees. The others will be sold,” he said.

Despite the SBU issuing a decree on Dec. 29 asking the construction company to consider halting their work “because of public tension,” concrete mixer trucks continue to be seen entering the controversial residential development.

Sokolnytsky said the company used several people “their contractor hired” to make sure the mixers make it to the site.

“We wanted to find out who is behind residents’ protests against the construction, that’s why we used those guys – they are not titushki,” Sokolnytsky added. “They were there just for two days. I instructed them, they were not allowed to use any force.”

The company will also hold a meeting with SBU representatives to discuss a possible halt of construction, according to Sokolnytsky.

“We have an agreement where deadlines were set,” Sokolnytsky said. “Now what? Stop construction? Then who’ll pay for the expenditures?

“That’s why we need to figure it out according to the law.”

Read also: A mysterious house builder.