You're reading: Yanukovych appoints Firtash to council

Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych has appointed billionaire Dmytro Firtash as head of the National Tripartite Social and Economic Council.

The relevant presidential decree, No. 107/2012, was signed on Feb. 17 and posted on the president’s website.

The appointment marks the increasing influence of Firtash under Yanukovych’s presidency. Firtash has close relations with Presidential Administration Chief Serhiy Lyovochkin, Energy Minister Yuriy Boyko and has been a partner in Ukraine’s largest television holding, UA Inter Media, with current Finance Minister and former SBU state security chief Valery Khoroshkovsky.

In the years leading to 2009, Firtash established himself as a major player in the supply of Central Asian gas to Ukraine and further to Europe. Camera shy in those years, he was co-owner along with Russia’s Gazprom of Swiss-registered RosUkrEnergo, which monopolized the multi-billion-dollar business of supplying Ukraine with natural gas from Russia and Central Asia.

In early 2009, then Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko cut RosUkrEnergo out as middleman supplier to Ukraine, inking direct supply agreements between Gazprom and Ukraine’s Naftogaz state energy company. Firtash suffered an additonal blow in 2009 when he lost control over Emfesz, a lucrative Hungarian gas trader. It was taken over by Swiss-registered RosGas, a company whose ownership remains unclear to this day.

Things turned positive again for Firtash in 2010.

Yanukovych, the candidate whom he backed, narrowly beat Tymoshenko in a presidential election. A year later, she was sentenced to seven years in prison for brokering the 2009 gas agreement with Russia that removed RosUkrEnergo as a middleman supplier of gas to Ukraine. The U.S. and EU have repeatedly expressed concern that the Tymoshenko trial and other charges prosecutors are pursuing against her are politically motivated attempts to sideline the opposition leader from politics.

Meanwhile, Firtash’s business in Ukraine is blossoming under Yanukovych’s rule.

He has become an increasingly public figure in Ukraine, seeking publicity for philanthropic activities and investments. He has been elected president of the Ukrainian Federation of Employers.

Since Yanukovych took over as president, Firtash consolidated control over many of Ukraine’s chemical plants, increased his grip over the nation’s lucrative titanium business and acquired the big but financially-troubled Nadra Bank. He reportedly owns a large share of Ukraine’s regional gas supply companies and has been described as the nation’s single largest employer.