Spiders in the bank and a "coup" in the Zaporizhzhya regional council

In Zaporizhzhia and the region, the struggle for the redistribution of power and positions, and, accordingly, for access to the distribution of budgetary resources, continues.

Thus, according to information from the editorial board of the publication "Open Ukraine", a "coup" in the Zaporizhzhya Regional Council is being prepared in the near future.

Gang of Four

The initiator of the “coup” is a newly created group that unites several odious Zaporizhzhya figures.

The first participant of this “coalition” is businessman Vemir Davityan, who did not show himself in any way until last autumn, when this young man began to introduce himself as the “overseer” of Zaporizhzhya from the Deputy Head of the Presidential Office, Kyrylo Tymoshenko.

In the group, he is responsible for communication with the central government: Vemir Davityan managed to convince KyryloTymoshenko of his ability to manage processes at the local level.

In fact, the businessman does not have any significant influence, so he is forced to constantly look for allies.

Now his allies are the notorious Marchenko brothers - Vladyslav and Mark, who became famous for their participation in corruption schemes in 2016-2017 and for running the Samopomich party; Vladyslav also held the post of deputy head of the regional council.

The Marchenko brothers’ resources include money, connections in political circles left over from their previous term, and influence on part of the “Servant of the People.”

In particular, Marchenko is a bridge from Davityan to another influential force in the region - Metinvest.

The brothers’ connections with Zaporizhstal have been well known since 2015.

Now Vladyslav Marchenko calls the general director of Metinvest, Yuriy Ryzhenkov, his “roof”.

In general, the media has already written about the Marchenko brothers trying to revive the institution of "overseers" in Zaporizhzhya, which came to naught after the expulsion of Viktor Yanukovych and the investigations into the "former overseer" Yevhen Anisimov.

The group also includes the deputy of the Zaporizhzhya Regional Council Viktor Shcherbyna, who previously headed the Zaporizhzhya District State Administration and the funeral service of the Zaporizhia region, closely associated with the “funeral” business.

Formally, Shcherbyna was elected from Batkivshchyna, but he is playing an independent game, moreover, against his own party members.

His resource is primarily financial.

Participation in the “funeral” business and resolving land issues in the Zaporizhzhya region are criminal, but also very profitable areas of activity.

One example of how this group operates is related to current events.

To ensure their own safety, the accomplices wanted to buy the loyalty of the head of the local department of strategic investigations of the National Police.

This division, in particular, deals with economic crimes, that is, it represents a “threat” to such a company of corrupt officials.

However, according to our information, the bribery attempt failed.

And the group decided to simply replace the head of the Ukrainian SSR by bribing high-ranking officials in Kyiv.

In this case, Vemir Davityan acts as a “negotiator”, and Viktor Shcherbyna acts as a “sponsor” of the action.

The Marchenko brothers are not specifically involved in this process, except for the fact that Vladyslav Marchenko ... let slip about this situation in his personal conversations.

Capture plan

The Zaporizhzhya Regional Council of the current convocation could not have started its work to this day - since no one could form a stable majority and elect a chairman.

This, by the way, was the first, but far from the last failure of the aforementioned Vemir Davityan.

Despite his promises to Kyrylo Tymoshenko, he was unable to “bend” the deputies under the “Servant of the People”.

In the end, the deputies themselves came to a shaky compromise.

Olena Zhuk, a “servant of the people” and a person of the former governor Vitaliy Bohovin, but without experience and without political ambitions, was elected head of the regional council.

The deputy chairmen were representatives of “For the Future” (Hennadiy Fuks, collaborating with Vemir Davytyan), “Opposition Bloc” (Lyudmyla Lyubim) and “Batkivshchyna” (Vladyslav Kutsenko).

The “coup” plan from Davityan, the Marchenko brothers and Shcherbyna involves the destruction of this unstable coalition, the removal of Olena Zhuk and her replacement with a person loyal to the “overseers”, as well as the expulsion of Lyudmila Lyubim and Vladyslav Kutsenko from the deputy chairpersons.

In general, the group wants to completely nullify the influence of the “Opposition Bloc” members (for example, former MP Yevhen Balitskyi) and Kutsenko-Kolesnikov (who in turn have been associated with MP Serhiy Sobolev for years).

To this end, the “conspirators” plan to create a new coalition consisting of “For the Future,” “Servant of the People,” “Unity,” and the Opposition Platform — For Life.

Moreover, two deputies from the Opposition Bloc are ready to join them: Oleksiy Kravchun and Ihor Chumachenko.

There are many reasons for the “revolution”, the main ones are, of course, financial issues.

Control over the regional council also means control over the financial flows of the entire region.

Moreover, the regional state administration is headed by Oleksandr Starukh, who also cooperates with Vemir Davityan through Hennadiy Fuks.

In particular, for example, Viktor Shcherbyna, as a result of the “coup,” wants to gain access to the “fat” medical budgets that are now controlled by Vladyslav Kutsenko.

Another factor in the “coup” is the attempt by former MP and former Party of Regions member, and now MP from the “Opposition Bloc” Yevhen Balitskyi to become a representative of the “Metinvest” group in the political circles of Zaporizhzhya.

The politician tried to lobby for such a position for himself in Kyiv, but only acquired a large number of opponents in Zaporizhzhya, who were not at all satisfied with the possible strengthening of Balitskyi.

At the same time, Viktor Shcherbyna is not against taking Davityan’s place as the “overseer” of the Kyiv authorities.

Therefore, he participates in the “coup” with a far-reaching plan - to get through to Kyrylo Timoshenko and propose his candidacy.

How to make money?

The secret union of the Marchenko brothers, Vemir Davityan and Viktor Shcherbyna promises to be short-lived - because each one is looking for ways to knock down other allies - but it has existed for a relatively long time.

Before the elections, the Marchenko brothers were unable to get on the “Servant of the People” list officially (they were rejected by Kiev as corrupt), so they simply… “bought out” part of the “Servant of the People” list from Vitaliy Bohovin for their people.

The SN lists for the elections to the Zaporizhia City Council and the Regional Council included a dozen people closely associated with the Marchenko brothers.

According to our information, it was Viktor Shcherbyna who financed this operation.

Later, Marchenko, Davityan and Shcherbyna jointly began to seize control over budget funds in education - through deputy mayor Oleksandr Vlasyuk and the recently dismissed secretary of the city council Anatoliy Kurtyev (incidentally, also involved in the “funeral” business).

Through these officials, Marchenko and Shcherbyna put pressure on the heads of the city education department and the tender committee.

The goal is to place your people in key positions and fully control the spending of budget funds.

The corruption scheme chosen is quite simple: tenders, in particular for repairs and the purchase of equipment, can be won by completely different and unrelated companies, but each winner must pay for their “success” with a kickback.

Contractors Marchenko and Shcherbyna, who have already won tenders, are threatened with delays in budget payments even for work already completed.

The solution they offer is still the same - a 20% kickback.

Marchenko, Davityan and Shcherbyna implemented a similar scheme, for example, at the regional level in the area of children’s health.

Here, too, officials and people who influence them have resorted to outright criminality.

The tenders were initially written in such a way that they would be won by firms close to the named group, as well as to the deputy governors Eduard Brutman and Zlata Nekrasova.

In particular, the conditions of the competitions were “tailored” for the victory of the Berdyansk health institutions, while the Kyryllov or Primorskyi institutions were deprived of a chance to win.

This selectivity is explained simply - the mayor of Berdyansk is Valeriy Baranov, who, together with the governor Oleksandr Starukh, is part of the same group that formed around Hennadiy Fuks and the “For the Future” party.

From the budget money earned, the health facilities of Berdyansk were also supposed to transfer 20-30% kickbacks, allegedly “to the security forces” and as a thank you to Kyrylo Tymoshenko.

However, the firms from Kyryllivka and Primorsk that lost the competition filed a complaint with the Antimonopoly Committee and achieved justice: the AMCU demanded that new tenders be held.

But in response to this, the Regional State Administration resorted to outright criminality: they cancelled tenders altogether, and began to conclude contracts for children’s health care with the necessary companies directly, without competitions.

The ideologist of this scheme was Vladyslav Marchenko, and Vemir Davityan organized the “work” through Deputy Governor Zlata Nekrasova.

Another Marchenko-Davityan-Shcherbyna scheme, in which deputy governors Zlata Nekrasova and Eduard Brutman are involved, is the development, or rather the embezzlement, of 105 million UAH for the renovation of the School of Higher Sports Mastery (SHVSM).

This renovation has already become yet another long-term construction project in Zaporizhzhya, having outlived several governors.

Under the new chairman of the regional state administration, the situation has become completely tragicomic.

On the one hand, the contractor has already been charged 25% kickbacks.

On the other hand, the contractor must now work a miracle by completing the repairs before the end of the year, that is, in the remaining six months.

Otherwise, the 105 million UAH allocated from the state budget will simply “burn up”.

Trying to get out of this situation, officials decided to close the SHVSM in order to speed up the repairs.

They can’t “postpone” training for six months due to repairs.

And if we take into account the organizational “abilities” of the current governor’s team, there is a risk that the reconstruction of the SHVSM could drag on for years, if not decades.

A major scandal related to the SHVSM is already brewing in the sports sphere.

Education, medicine, health, sports, infrastructure - these are just a few of the areas that the group of Marchenko brothers, Vemir Davityan and Viktor Shcherbyna are trying to get their hands on.

More precisely, to launch them even deeper.

Considering that all members of this group had problems with the law before, we can only hope first and foremost for law enforcement officers who can prevent the rule of crime in Zaporizhzhya.

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