You're reading: ​Poroshenko warns oligarchs, alludes to Akhmetov

President Petro Poroshenko promised to punish oligarchs who use staged protests to pressure the state and who put their private interests above the nation's well-being.

The warning addressed the protest of coal miners in Kyiv on April 22 that many, including Poroshenko apparently, believe were staged by Ukraine’s richest billionaire, Rinat Akhmetov, in response to state pressure on his energy company DTEK, which employs the protesting miners.

Speaking on TV on April 24, Poroshenko accused oligarchs and politicians of abusing the people’s right to protest. “The oligarchs who plan to pressure authorities with fake protests will be punished,” said Poroshenko. The billionaire president, incidentally, is also considered as an oligarch.

Akhmetov, whose net worth was estimated as $7.7 billion by Ukrainian Focus magazine in 2015, was a top supporter of the former ruling Party of Regions and ousted President Viktor Yanukovych.

Since Yanukovych fled to Russia on Feb. 22, 2014, amid the EuroMaidan Revolution, Akhmetov has lost influence. Most of his Akhmetov’s businesses are concentrated in Ukraine, especiallly the eastern Donbas where combined Russian-separatist forces are waging war.

Many see Akhmetov since then as trying to preserve his influence and wealth without alienating either Russia, which heavily backed Yanukovych, or the new government led by Poroshenko and Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk.

The miners who protested next to government buildings on April 22 demanded the resignation of Energy Minister Volodymyr Demchyshyn. The decision by Demchyshyn to import energy supplies, they said, threatened domestic mines.

Poroshenko didn’t name Akhmetov directly when talking about the organizers of the staged protest, but said there were “certain oligarchs” and politicians using staged protests to pressure the state.

“Do miners have the right to protest?” said Poroshenko. “Undoubtedly. But can we allow swindlers, who have nothing to do with mining, use this right?”

He added there were documented facts of the protesters being paid for their presence.

Days before the protest, lawmaker Anton Herashchenko of the People’s Front party filed a draft law proposing to punish the organizers of paid rallies with an eight-year prison term. The law wasn’t yet considered by parliament.

Soon after the strike, pro-presidential lawmaker and former journalist Mustafa Nayem published a document allegedly leaked to him from Akhmetov’s DTEK company. It outlined the plan to protect DTEK’s business through pressuring the government with staged protests among other measures.

DTEK commented that it didn’t know the origin of the document.

Poroshenko has promised that the staged miners’ protest of April 22 will be taken into account for the de-oligarchization of Ukraine program.

“We will deal with it like we did when we cleaned up the oil and gas trade field,” said Poroshenko, referring to the way parliament stripped another top oligarch Ihor Kolomoyskiy of his influence on the state-owned gas and oil trading companies through improved legislation in March.

“We won’t allow anyone to rob the country and suck the taxpayers’ money out of it as they did 20 years ago,” Poroshenko said.