Alexander Vilkul. The forgotten past of the candidate for mayor of Dnepropetrovsk

Alexander Vilkul is a rather mysterious and resonant personality; during his political career he managed to be in both the ruling party and the opposition, he was both Deputy Prime Minister and Governor, as they say, “a talented person is talented in everything.” In October, Ukraine is facing local elections, and Alexander Yuryevich will fight for the seat of mayor of Dnepropetrovsk. However, there are quite a lot of “blank spots” in his political past, which for some reason everyone remembers only when the election campaign approaches.

The path to big politics

On the pages of the official biography of Alexander Yuryevich you will not find an answer to the question of who this person really is. According to it, he began his “career career” as an assistant to an excavator driver at the Southern Mining and Processing Plant company, where he acted as a mining foreman, but in reality everything was somewhat different. Vilkul actually worked at this plant immediately after graduating from university. Despite this, he began his career ascent as head of the company’s commercial department. After a year in this position, he was promoted to the position of General Director for Commercial and Financial Affairs.

Soon, Alexander also became deputy president for economics and foreign economic relations of the public organization “Academy of Mining Sciences of Ukraine”. However, in 2002 he returned to his “alma mater” again – already in the status of deputy head of the board for commercial issues. After that, a year later, he became director of OJSC Central Mining and Processing Plant in Krivoy Rog. A couple of years later he became the general director of OJSC Northern Mining and Processing Plant and OJSC Central Mining and Processing Plant, which is part of the Metinvest holding controlled by Rinat Akhmetov. A year later, Alexander Vilkul was appointed honorary director of the mining division of OJSC Metinvest Holding.

In 2006, Vilkul was elected for the first time as a people’s deputy of Ukraine on the list of the Party of Regions (No. 59). While working in the Rada, Vilkul became deputy head of the committee on industrial and regulatory policy. Obviously, he worked well, because Viktor Yanukovych personally sent him to Dnepropetrovsk. According to the so-called “Akhmetov quota”, Alexander Yuryevich became the head of the Dnieper Regional State Administration. A couple of years later, he was again expected to be promoted – in December 2012, he was appointed Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine. In political circles they say that Vilkul has always been a counterweight to Sergei Arbuzov. He was considered a representative of the interests of Rinat Akhmetov in the Rada and was assigned the position of Prime Minister – it was he who was supposed to become the main opponent of Sergei Arbuzov. After the revolutionary events on Maidan, Vilkul was dismissed as “undesirable” to the revolutionary government. In the early parliamentary elections, Alexander Vilkul became number two on the list of the Opposition Bloc party and it was with it that he again entered the Rada.

Where does Alexander Vilkul get his income from?

Alexander Yuryevich’s favorite business is construction, buying land and shopping centers. Alexander Yuryevich regards the income Vilkul receives on the basis of “Akhmetov’s enterprises” as deposit interest for servicing the oligarch’s business. And the main outsourcers and contractors that serve the needs of mining and processing plants are Vilkul enterprises: PJSC “Electromashpromservice”, PP “Spetskontakt”, PP “Promestetika”, PP “Promresurs KR”, etc. Large plots of land in Krivoy Rog, various real estate properties and shopping complexes in the city are owned by Alexander Yuryevich, although legally they are registered in the name of dummy people and organizations.

Alexander Yuryevich actively cooperates with criminal leaders, ensuring his loyalty, untouchability and safety. Thus, the city’s largest shopping complex, Plaza, was built in partnership with the local crime boss, Tyson. The entire construction business in Krivoy Rog has long been occupied by the governor’s pocket contractor – the construction company KROST LLC, which serves both personal interests for Vilkul and acts as the general contractor of the city budget – by erecting city fountains, Residents of Krivoy Rog are confident: everything that KROST built » – belongs to Alexander Vilkul. According to the source, directly or indirectly, through partners, Alexander Yuryevich monopolized 80% of the lands of Krivoy Rog.

The seeds for Alexander Vilkul’s successful business in his hometown were sown by his father Yuri, who is still the mayor of Krivoy Rog. Together with their son, they carried out many so-called “projects”, which were not always legal and legitimate.

One of them is the Semeyka chain of budget supermarkets, which, as local residents say, “simply disfigured the beautiful architectural composition of the city,” and are popularly nicknamed “yellow dry closets.” Probably, the permissiveness on the part of the city authorities, or more precisely, my own father, made it possible to install these yellow “Family” vans in the city center and places of public recreation in violation of fire, sanitary, city-forming standards and measures.

To subjugate the city’s consumption market, Alexander Vilkul chose to capture the market for the production and sale of bread. That is why most of the city’s bakeries have long been closed for “reconstruction”, and bread is brought to Krivoy Rog from Dnepropetrovsk and Zaporozhye, where the governor’s bakeries are located. And that is why Yuri Vilkul, at the suggestion of his son Alexander, acquired a share of the Kharkov commercial bread manufacturer Kulichi LLC.

“Feats” as Vice Prime Minister

Having assumed the post of Deputy Prime Minister, Alexander Vilkul was actively involved in the “Hyundai issue,” which kept breaking down and getting stuck on the Ukrainian railway. It was he who promised to adapt the “obstinate” equipment purchased by his fellow minister Boris Kolesnikovhowever, he was removed from his position without allowing the problem to be resolved.

Alexander Yuryevich proved himself to be a tireless “financial assistant” in matters related to the preparation of sports competitions. At one time, Vilkul was appointed responsible for the EuroBasket 2015 and the Winter Olympics 2022. Immediately after this decision, doubts arose about his competence, because even at Euro 2012 the amount of government spending spent on the event exceeded the necessary by 80% – a total of 65 billion UAH was “left” from the budget. One can only guess how much would have gone out of the budget if Vilkul had full control and access to the preparation of these events in Ukraine.

As Deputy Prime Minister, Vilkul stated that training facilities for athletes would be built in 6 cities at the expense of the state budget. The official quickly made a fuss, and Tornado SKV LLC (which had not previously won a single tender) received the right to finance the construction of the bases at initially inflated prices. Another such project was a training base in Dneprodzerzhinsk, which was to be designed by the Krivoy Rog construction group of companies “KROST” (it was mentioned above that the company actually belongs to Vilkul). All these factors only speak of the benefits of Vilkul’s resignation during the revolutionary events on the Maidan. This fact confirms that during the year of work in the Cabinet of Ministers, Vilkul managed to completely fail almost all the projects for which he was responsible. His only success was fraud with government funds, which he managed to direct to various “dubious” projects.

Interview with Alexandra Vilkul to the 112 Ukraine TV channel:

https://youtu.be/4oc_QpqcB44

We have no right to say that Alexander Vilkul will be a bad mayor, but his past “exploits” and “merits” make us wonder whether we should trust a person who promises “mountains from the sky” and does absolutely nothing?

Dmitry Samofalov, for SKELET-info