Odessa businessmen who were considered to be overseers of Ukraine’s airports under Yanukovych continue their “hobby” under the new government
The Odessa City Hall continues to sue for an increase in its share in the Odessa International Airport LLC, which currently has sole control over the property of the municipal enterprise of the same name. As SLED.net.ua learned, last week the City Council finally challenged the decision of the Odessa Regional Economic Court, which had rejected its claim a month earlier, in the Odessa Economic Court of Appeal. It recently accepted its appeal for consideration, setting the hearing for February 12. The scandalous Odessans Alexander Granovsky and Boris Kaufman are vitally interested in the decision of the first instance being upheld. After all, it is their ears that are sticking out behind the “foreign investor” of the Southern Palmyra air gate – the London-registered firm Odessa Airport Development Limited, which owns 75% of the shares in Odessa International Airport LLC through Odessa Airport Development LLC.
Boris Kaufman and Viktor Yanukovych Jr.
As previously reported, the Odessa airport was actually given to Granovsky and Kaufman as a gift from the “Family”. After Viktor Yanukovych came to power, the two businessmen became “overseers” of the largest airports in Ukraine on behalf of the eldest son of the former president, Oleksandr Yanukovych. The first to fall under their control was the Odessa airport, which they pushed through the transfer of to their company on behalf of the city council in 2011. That same year, they were given control of the Simferopol international airport, which was then run by protégés of Kaufman and Granovsky. And finally, in 2013, the tireless Odessans received a gift in the form of the opportunity to manage the Boryspil airport, where their protégé Oleksiy Kochanov was appointed head.
Alexey Kochanov
Last year, after Yanukovych’s regime fell and he himself became the “Rostov Lustrat”, the scheme broke down. In February, Russian “little green men” seized the Simferopol airport, which was later nationalized, and in March, the new Minister of Infrastructure asked Alexey Kochanov to leave Boryspil.
But Kaufman and Granovsky have dug in seriously at the Odessa airport. In addition to the Odessa International Airport LLC, they put their man (Igor Chernik) at the head of the state enterprise Directorate for the Construction of the Odessa International Airport. Which, at the end of 2013, promptly held a tender for the construction of the airport’s airfield complex and signed a general contract with a shell company that had neither work experience nor its own equipment (Spetsrembud LLC), for a sum of more than 1.6 billion hryvnia. Its main advantage was, of course, that Kaufman and Granovsky were behind it.
Kaufman’s Night Visit to Poroshenko’s Administration
The Odessa Regional Prosecutor’s Office tried to challenge this scandalous tender after the change of power. But by the time this process began, Boris Kaufman was noticed in the Administration of President Petro Poroshenko, and rumors began to spread that the unsinkable Odessans had become friends with the new government. Moreover, their lobbyist was the head of the AP Boris Lozhkin, with whom Kaufman and Granovsky had found a common language several years ago, having bought the Focus magazine from him. It is not surprising that soon after this, the Prosecutor’s Office ineptly lost the court proceedings, and did not even consider it necessary to file an appeal. In addition, none of the officials have even hinted at dismissing Chernik from the state enterprise “Directorate for the Construction of the Odessa International Airport”, although there are enough grounds for this if desired. And considering the level of people with whom the former favorites of the Yanukovych regime have become friends, one can conclude that they will not have problems in the dispute with the Odessa City Council. If, of course, Kaufman and Granovsky are allowed to use their favorite methods of “stimulating” the right people.
To be continued…
Alexey KOZHEMYAKIN, SLED.net.ua
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