Editor’s Note: This is part 1 of an investigative project into ex-Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s residential real estate holdings. Part 2 will examine Yanukovych’s commercial property. The investigative project is being conducted by the Washington-based Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, a Kyiv Post partner.
This story is also published on the OCCRP website here
Luxury residences and a handful
of offices in downtown Kyiv. A small palace for the mistress. A mansion for a conveniently
“forgetful” judge. A needless helipad.
Here are a few stories on the
projects that Tantalit, the nominal owner of the billion-dollar, 140-hectare Mezhyhirya
estate, was involved in, besides the development of the country’s residence
number one on behalf of ousted President Viktor Yanukovych.
Real estate documents, such as construction cost estimates and
blueprints, acts of acceptance, receipts for allocation of land plots or
utility bills comprise a considerable share of the documents found in Mezhyhirya.
This was Yanukovych’s residence until he fled on Feb. 21 and ultimately settled
in Russia, where he is a fugitive wanted for mass murder and under
investigation for pilfering state assets.
Most of the documents left behind by Yanukovych are related to the residence
itself, from the luxurious wooden mansion Honka to the ostrich farm.
However, a huge amount of documentation for the construction and
maintenance of residential and commercial properties outside of Mezhyhirya have
also been found in the stash of Tantalit’s archives, some of involving
properties of the presidential family while other documents include properties not
previously associated with Mezhyhirya.
Abandoned apartments downtown
Boasting the most luxurious estate in the country, the presidential
family remained reluctant to part with luxury apartments in the center of Kyiv.
One such apartments listed on Tantalit’s balance is located in a
scandalous building at 9a Hrushevskoho St., close to Mariinsky Park, one the
most important green areas in the city.
A woman who introduced herself as the head of the building’s condominium
insisted that neither the former president nor his sons ever lived there. But she
refused to disclose the names of the residents of the luxury apartment.
Yet, in 2010-2011, regular utility payments for the apartment B17-1 in
this building were held through the accounts of Tantalit.
Moreover, the bills were paid by Manaher LLC via its manager Andriy Dudnikov.
A person with the same name was previously known as a manager of Realty Estate
Group, an indirect owner of the so-called Yanukovych “family” UkrBusinessBank.
But the bills of the same period from Kyiv’s municipal technical
inventory bureau were issued in the name of the former president himself.
Unfortunately, Dudnikov could not be reached as the official Manaher phone
number was disconnected at the time of publication.
Apartment 18 at 10 Mazepa St., which is in Kyiv’s central Pechersk
neighborhood, is one more estate part of Tantalit’s assets. In 2008, Yanukovych
sold this apartment to Serhiy Klyuyev (a Ukrainian member of parliament) for a
sensational $33 million. At the time, Yanukovych explained that he had to sell
all his belongings in order to redeem his house in Mezhyhirya.
But even then, the price of the sale raised suspicions that the purchase
and sale transaction were part of a money laundering scheme. According to the
security guard of the building, neither the seller nor buyer has ever lived in
the notorious apartment. Meanwhile, according to cash vouchers and receipts, Tantalit
continued to hold it on its balance sheets, suggesting that no sales
transaction ever took place.
Yanukovych’s apartment at 15/5 Obolon Quay is another real estate tidbit.
The fact that Yanukovych had been registered there for quite a long time
has been known.
But Tantalit kept hold of it even after the former president settled
into Mezhyhirya. Moreover, sometimes the bills were paid by Manaher. According
to neighbors, there were some recent renovations, but no one had ever moved in.
And, perhaps, no one will soon, since in early March prosecutors sealed it up.
There on the waterfront, along with the estates of Serhiy Kivalov, the former
head of the Central Election Commission of Ukraine, and Svyatoslav Piskun, a
former prosecutor general of Ukraine, the presidential family had a private
house – an unfinished cottage (at 33 Obolon Quay).
The land for it was registered with KyivBudZhytlo, founded by Budynok
Lesnika company. The estate was traditionally attributed to Yanukovych’s elder
son Oleksandr.
According to a local security guard, it was only once that one of Yanukovych’s
sons, identified as a “rider,” visited the place: “Once, something like two
years ago, he sailed on a yacht, that was the only time he was here.” Thereafter
construction stalled at the stage of “bare walls.” No one has ever settled
there either.
Located a few steps from the apartment near the waterfront is the beauty
salon “Chrystal Spa,” which belongs to Viktor Yanukovych’s civil wife, Lyubov
Polezhay. She is the owner of eponymous LLC.
The salon was closed in early March for “technical reasons.” According
to the employees of the restaurant, located on the same premises, the beauty salon
had not been working for at least a week at that moment. However, it is not the
only property rapidly abandoned after the bloody events of EuroMaidan, in which
nearly 100 protesters were killed by Feb. 20.
Me and mini-me: Polezhay’s estate near Mezhyhirya
It turns out that Polezhai was building another mansion just near the
fence of Mezhyhirya, at 1a Svyatoslavska St., in the so-called Lazarus Garden.
Her ownership is confirmed by the record in the State Architectural and
Construction Inspection. The builder from the neighboring house told us that
the former president visited this estate once and this was, allegedly, a reason
to block the traffic at the surrounding streets.
The construction was overseen from Mezhyhirya. A folder with documents
on this house was found on the same shelf with similar documents on
Mezhyhirya’s property. A design album was found in the office of Oleksandr
Fainitskyi, director of KyivUniveralService. This firm performed as
Mezhyhirya’s utilities company, providing maintenance of buildings and
territory and personnel not only for Mezhyhirya, but also for state residence
Synyohora in the Carpathians. It doesn’t come as a surprise that, apart from
the main Yanukovych’s villa, Fainitskyi was also supervising Polezhay’s house.
Contractors for the construction of Polezhay’s house were also close to
so-called former president’s Family’s firms. For instance, facades were done by
the firm PSK Antakarana. It also did the same type of works in one of the guest
houses at Mezhyhirya, its laboratory and golf club. In addition, this company
supplied the building materials for the presidential residence.
Although the works on the house were not completed, its appearance
demonstrates that everything here was to be done in the same pattern as Mezhyhirya.
There was barbed wire along the fence, columns, fretworks and marble outside
the house. Luxurious interiors had already been designed.
In footsteps of Crimean minister
Utility bills from Tantalit’s accountant’s office lead to another house
nearby Mezhyhirya. The presidential residence has an official address at 19 Ivana
Franka St. in Novy Petrivtsi. There is a private house directly opposite to it,
at 18 Ivana Franka St.
No one has ever paid attention to it, even though it stands just a few
meters across the street, has the same fence as the residence itself, and even
painted in the same lemon shade of yellow as the administrative building in
Mezhyhirya.
Among Tantalit’s outgoing cash orders to issue money, there were orders
totaling nearly Hr 3 million (as of late 2010) for the construction works,
gasification, subsequent utilities and protection of the neighboring building.
In addition, there’s a letter from Tantalit director Pavlo Lytovchenko
asking KyivUniveralService to assign a person responsible for this building and
to forward all bills to Tantalit office at 11 Voloska St. in Kyiv.
According to the bills, the house is formally considered as residential.
And according to the builders, there is some kind of a hotel or a dormitory
there. Unfortunately, it is impossible to either deny or confirm this
information yet, since this building, unlike the main property complex
Mezhyhirya, has not been opened for the public.
Although the house was built at the expense of Tantalit, contract for
the work and compliance certificate from the gas distribution company, as well
as the electric bills were issued to O.S. Kanevskyi. The same surname appears
on the cash orders for the state certificate of registration of the land plot
and on the construction permits. According to the database of the State
Architectural and Construction Inspection, residential building at this address
belongs to Oleksandr Samuilovych Kanevsky.
There appears to be only one person with such name in the entire
country, and it happens to be a former health minister of Crimea.
Starting from the 1990s, Kanevsky headed various divisions of the
railway hospitals in Kharkiv, Odesa, Donetsk and Kyiv. In 2011, he headed the
medical department of Ukraine’s railways. Kanevsky held the minister’s post for
two years, but lost the job in the late February 2014, when the self-proclaimed
Prime Minister of Crimea Serhiy Aksyonov formed his own new government.
Given the current situation in Crimea, the local government’s phones
have been not working while a former Kanevsky deputy doesn’t answer his cell
phone.
Estate for judge in Koncha-Zaspa
Among the few documents which remained dry and safe after an unsuccessful
attempt to destroy them before Yanukovych’s escape late night escape on Feb. 21,
some were connected to the building No. 51 in Kyiv’s upscale suburb Koncha-Zaspa,
which is located on the territory owned by the State Administration of Affairs.
However, it appears the building was privately owned.
The first contract for the “reconstruction of the building No. 51” was
concluded on Aug. 15 with “AES-GROUP” Ltd. Its preliminary cost was Hr 10.3 million.
All works had to be finished by the end of December.
In December, the contractor was either replaced or supplemented by a
company named Shatro Ltd. This company is known for being one of the
contractors of construction of a laboratory at Mezhyhirya.
The annex to a contract revealed that the plan was to build a three-story
residential house with the area of 835 square meters, business premises, summer
kitchen, garage and chapel. The cost of the business premises’ construction was
about Hr 1.87 million with a garage costing Hr 226,000. It is worth mentioning that
the acts are dated January 2014, which means that construction here had been
conducted till the very end of Yanukovych’s rule.
Two facts are of particular interest.
The first is that the customer for all mentioned documents is Vyacheslav
Ovcharenko, a judge well-known for “losing” lawsuits to Yanukovych.
In the 1980s, Ovcharenko worked as a lawyer for “OrdgonikidzeCoal” at the
same time Yanukovych held a position of a director of the local motor depot. In
2001, Ovcharenko became a judge at Yenakievo city court, and headed it the next
year. At that very time, the disappearance of documents in Yanukovych’s
criminal record — involving convictions
for theft and assault in 1967 and 1970 — was discovered. Ovcharenko explained
the case by the improper protection of the court’s buildings.
In 2006, Ovcharenko’s career took a dramatic shift upwards as he became
a judge of the Constitutional Court, which exactly coincided with Yanukovych’s second
tenure as Ukraine’s prime minister. In October 2013, Ovcharenko headed the
Constitutional Court. In late February, according to the decision of the
Ukrainian Parliament, he was dismissed from the office for violating the oath.
According to the records of the tender on Building No. 51 at
Koncha-Zaspa, the venue of the tender was 19 Ivana Franka St., Novy Petrivtsi,
i.e. the presidential residence itself. A chairman of the tender committee was a
man named Fainytskyi, previously mentioned as the head of the utilities at
Mezhyhirya. His signature endorsed both protocols.
Thus, construction of the judge’s luxury residential estate in
Koncha-Zaspa was supervised personally by Fainytskyi. Moreover, Ovcharenko’s
correspondence with the head of the State Administration of Affairs Andryi
Kravets was kept in the legal department of the Mezhyhirya archives. From their
letters, we find out that Ovcharenko asked permission to reconstruct a home,
provided him for the use, and Kravets allowed to carry out work at Ovcharenko’s
own expense.
Ovcharenko couldn’t be reached through the reception at Constitutional
Court to comment on this story.
At the moment, Ukraine’s general prosecutor has already transported
Mezhyhirya’s documents to its repository and will be investigating why all the
described paperwork and procurement passed through Yanukovych’s presidential
residence.
Lesya Ivanova works with Nashi Groshi, Kateryna
Kapliuk works with Slidstvo.info) and Denys Bigus works with ZIK
