Igor Bakai. “Father” of gas corruption. PART 2

CONTINUATION. START: Igor Bakai. “Father” of gas corruption. PART 1

The monopolist made the biggest jackpot on the resale of gas to Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. Such re-exports fluctuated, according to Skelet.Infowithin 7-8 billion cubic meters annually. If Russian gas delivered to Ukraine cost $80, and Turkmen gas – $60, then Eastern Europe bought it for $100-110. Plus $20 to “settle” issues with Naftogaz. Turkmenistan was the first to suspect something. They refused to supply the resource to chronic defaulters. The volumes of gas decreased, but Bakai did not lose his head. He decided to pump it out of pipelines that went to Europe. So he received $1.43 billion worth of fuel (about 18 billion cubic meters – the country’s annual production). Almost all the gas went to Europe. Poland, Hungary and Slovakia confirmed receipt of the declared volumes. And Ukraine was left with nothing. The profit from this fraud reached $360 million. This is the money that the state lost due to the light hand of gas magnate Bakai. However, not the entire amount went into Igor Mikhailovich’s pocket. His part is interest, the lion’s share belonged to his patron, Leonid Kuchma. But Bakai was left with nothing:

– in 1998, he transferred money three times through the Kiev bank “Finance and Credit” of Konstantin Zhevago to a commercial bank in San Francisco – $450 thousand, $380 thousand, $680 thousand;

– “Finance and Credit” transferred 2.4 million to the account of the company “Dogmatos Trading Ltd” in Ireland;

– in 1999, transferring $550 thousand to a controlled account of United Global Enterprises Ltd in Hong Kong using the Hong Kong and Shanghai Financial Corporation.

In addition to pumping gas from pipelines, Igor Bakai, as chairman of NAC, purchased energy resources for the state at inflated prices through intermediary companies. So he “laundered” hundreds of millions of dollars into the “shadow”. Moreover, he placed the work of most Ukrainian oil and gas production enterprises under personal control. Igor Mikhailovich’s business empire consisted of dozens of companies, among which were Ukrneftegazokomplekt, Ukrgazservice, Energia, Eurasia Trading Ltd., Neftegazsnabenergo, Ukrgazkontrakt, etc.

Dmitry Tabachnik, Leonid Kuchma, Alexander Volkov (far right)

In 1998, Alexander Volkov, the all-powerful favorite of President Kuchma, came to parliament.

Bakai begins to befriend him and joins his clan. In 1999, he became a member of the “Revival of the Regions” group created by Volkov, which united all the “moneybags”, and also actively participates in the life of the Democratic Union party.

There was also some veiled charity. The gas magnate created the Charitable Fund for Social Protection of the Population (“Social Protection”, or popularly known as the “Bakai Fund”). On the eve of the New Year 1999, a publication appeared in the press about how Igor Mikhailovich came to a boarding school for children with cerebral palsy and distributed gifts to everyone. Girls – Barbie dolls, boys – toy cars. It would seem like a wonderful gesture, but one could have been more generous. But then every penny of the Bakai Fund counted. The money was collected not so much for disabled children, but for the election campaign of Leonid Danilovich.

Volkov “nominated” Kuchma for a second presidential term and created the well-known image of the “new old President.” Igor Bakai is paying for the election campaign, but giving much less money than Kuchma asked him to give. The gas magnate made 2 tranches: 48.8 million hryvnia and 10.5 million dollars. Igor Mikhailovich associated such amounts with the fact that the government of Viktor Yushchenko tried to put NAC within the legal framework. However Skelet.Info it is known that he simultaneously sponsored the election fund of SPU leader Alexander Moroz, the main opponent of Leonid Kuchma. Apparently, Leonid Danilovich was so happy about the new term that he forgave Bakai, but remembered the “trick”.

During this period, Igor Bakai became persona non grata for the USA and Great Britain. When Leonid Kuchma arrived for a meeting in Washington, he was given a list of the most corrupt officials. Igor Mikhailovich was number 1.

Later, when the country was stirred up by Melnichenko’s films, it would turn out that Bakai, with his characteristic simplicity of a forester, was fooling Kuchma and hiding NAC’s reporting. He also tried to earn extra money from Naftogaz. And for this he stole the intellectual property of the Ukrainian fuel and energy complex. This story deserves attention.

Bakai scheme

Igor Bakai and the head of the presidential administration Vladimir Litvin (at that time the first adviser to President Leonid Kuchma) created a company that sold Naftogaz a very interesting invention – “Method of vibration control of machines.”

Vladimir Litvin

In 1987, the state received an author’s certificate for it from the State Patent, and the right to dispose of it – two research institutes. After 10 years, one of the institutes again applied to the State Patent with a request to confirm the right to use, but it turned out that the invention had long belonged to the private commercial structure “Newest Microtechnologies”. Moreover, the company handed over all permitting documents to several individuals, including Igor Bakai. Further – more: these individuals headed the law firm “New Science-Intensive Technologies” (Bakai contributed 40 thousand hryvnia to the authorized capital, and Vladimir Lytvyn – 41 thousand hryvnia) and on its behalf sold intellectual property to Naftogaz. The transaction amount was 180 million hryvnia (at the exchange rate of that time – about 100 million dollars), the balance was paid until 2007. “Method of vibration control of machines” is the know-how of professional historian Litvin and professional forester Bakai. Also, businesses on behalf of “New Science-Intensive Technologies” invented “something” and sold it to NAC for dizzying sums. In total, they “pushed” 88 patents.

Having learned about fraud with scientific inventions, Leonid Danilovich became very angry. Everyone turned against Bakai – from Kuchma to Yulia Tymoshenko, who became Deputy Prime Minister in the government of Viktor Yushchenko, and finally got the opportunity to take revenge for the UESU. Lady Yu turned to American experts, and they provided her with an official conclusion: Naftogaz pumped out $4 million worth of gas every day and then sold it to other countries. Yulia Vladimirovna put this conclusion on Leonid Kuchma’s table. Tymoshenko also traveled to Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) and learned that Ukraine’s debt to Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) for gas supplies amounts to $2.23 billion. The head of Naftogaz, reporting, knocked it down to $740 million. Danilych defended Bakai with all his might. However, Tymoshenko and Yushchenko insisted that the “friend of the president” immediately leave the post of head of NAC. Leonid Kuchma made sure that Igor Mikhailovich was “revealed” by Mykola Azarov, who then headed the State Tax Administration of Ukraine.

So Igor Bakai flew out of the chair of the head of Naftogaz, and his people lost open access to gas and cash flows. True, before leaving, he held a press conference and stated that he could not work under such pressure and was resigning. It became a real sensation because no one could understand what the reason was, what happened.

At the time of Igor Mikhailovich’s resignation, Ukraine’s debt to Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) for energy resources amounted to more than $1.4 billion. But they could not bring the gas tycoon to justice. Kuchma punished his “friend” differently. According to Skelet.Infoeverything was simply taken away from Bakai – his apartment and car, and his accounts were blocked. He walked around Kyiv and asked for a loan.

Igor Bakai. Chief Submariner

In the summer of 2000, Bakai returned to big politics. He put forward his candidacy for people’s deputies in the vacated constituency in Zhitomir. Vladimir Litvin came to his aid, using all his administrative resources. Residents of the Zhytomyr region remembered for a long time the scope of the election campaign: the arrival of popular Russian performers, like Kristina Orbakaite, fairs and other PR delights of technologists. Skelet.Info I found out the amount that Igor Mikhailovich spent on political strategists – $1 million. But they paid off – the ousted gas tycoon won the election.

Igor Bakai in the Verkhovna Rada

In 2001, the tax police of the State Tax Administration of Ukraine took on the long-suffering Naftogaz and opened a criminal case for tax evasion. The amount in question was 1.9 billion hryvnia. The head of the State Tax Administration Nikolai Azarov said that Igor Bakai’s share in this case is 770 million hryvnia. True, by this time Igor Mikhailovich already had a parliamentary mandate and it was possible to bring him to justice only after a parliamentary decision. But the issue was not brought up for consideration.

A year later, the gas tycoon’s luck ran out. He was defeated in his native Rivne region in the 2002 parliamentary elections. Bakai lost miserably to “our Ukrainian” Yuri Shirko and disappeared from view for a year. State Tax Administration has lost interest in the ex-head of Naftogaz of Ukraine. Many predicted the oligarch’s departure from the political arena, but that was not the case.

In 2003, Leonid Kuchma signed a decree appointing his “friend” as the new chairman of the State Committee for Water Management of Ukraine. Bakai replaced the little-known Viktor Khorev, who, by the way, led the industry for almost 13 years. Khorev, according to the official version, resigned due to reaching retirement age. This reshuffle in the government caused surprise and excitement: everyone understood that the gas magnate had returned to public politics.

Igor Bakai. Legendary DUSYA

After 3 months, the President signed a new decree and transferred Igor Mikhailovich to the position of head of the State Administration of Affairs of Ukraine (DSi – among the people).

This structure ensured the activities of Leonid Kuchma, the Verkhovna Rada, the Cabinet of Ministers and other government bodies; dozens of state enterprises and organizations were under its management. Igor Bakai was at the helm of the Dusi for a little over a year. During this time, as they say in criminal circles, he stole. The oligarch resold hotels, real estate of the National Complex, and health centers in Crimea. For personal purposes, he used the aviation equipment of the Ukraina airline: during the year, 68 flights were made on commercial flights, which cost the state 1 million hryvnia. True, Igor Mikhailovich did not leave his deputies without anything: he gave each of them an apartment in Kyiv.

Igor Bakai was tolerated because, under his sensitive leadership as an all-knowing gas swindler, the Ukrainian-Russian company Rosukrenergo was created, which became a monopoly on the Ukrainian market and thanks to which the country depended on Russian gas. The newly created structure was headed by Dmitry Firtash, a diligent student of Igor Mikhailovich. The head of the Dusi, as a valuable inheritance, handed over all the money laundering schemes for illegal enrichment to Firtash.

Dmitry Firtash is a worthy student of Igor Bakai

The fall of Bakai’s empire occurred in 2004: the political climate in the country began to change, Kuchma served out his second term and had no intention of going for a third. The oligarch did not wait for favor from Yushchenko, Tymoshenko or Yanukovych. When the 2004 presidential campaign ended, Igor Bakai left Ukraine. His departure was called an escape.

In addition, then the bankruptcy procedure of the Intergaz company began after the filing of a corresponding claim by the Russian Gazprom. It lasted 7 years. In 2011, the Economic Court of Kyiv approved the liquidator’s report. Themis established that Intergaz has no assets and cannot pay the creditor. The court liquidated the legal entity. Bakai’s company owes Gazprom 1.276 billion hryvnia. By the way, Intergaz owes the monopolist Naftogaz Ukraine 20 million hryvnia, and the Krivorozhstal plant owes 61.7 million hryvnia.

Igor Bakai. Either escape or not

In February 2005, law enforcement officers accused the former head of the DUSI of exceeding and abusing official powers. He also began to be suspected of involvement in the commission of a number of serious economic crimes and the illegal alienation of state property: the Dnepr and Ukraina hotels, the real estate of the Expocenter of Ukraine National Complex in Kyiv, and several Crimean health resorts. The KRU checked the DUS and found that Igor Mikhailovich and his company illegally spent 828.5 hryvnia.

Since May 2005, Bakai was wanted by Interpol and, of course, could not be found. At this time he was in Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) and had already received citizenship. In Ukraine, criminal cases against the oligarch did not move forward even under the new Orange government. In 2006, the Pechersky Court of Kyiv decided to terminate the investigation.

The fugitive oligarch, who had been on the international wanted list for a year, was found himself. On the air of the Inter channel. The entire Ukrainian political community froze in anticipation: Igor Mikhailovich promised to name the Ukrainian founders of RosUkrEnergo, talk about the affairs of the deputies of the Our Ukraine bloc – Alexander Tretyakov (ex-first assistant to President Yushchenko), Petro Poroshenko (ex-secretary of the National Security and Defense Council) and Petro Yushchenko ( brother of the president). However, there were no sensations; Bakai changed his mind about leaking incriminating evidence. In a 40-minute interview, the fugitive oligarch said that he does not intend to return to Ukraine and for him this is a “passed stage.” He showed his passport as a Russian citizen, and also “exposed” his wristwatch, either made of white gold or platinum. But the name “RosUkrEnergo” was not mentioned at all in the interview. Let’s assume that at that moment Igor Mikhailovich was at the stage of negotiations with his opponents. Yes, and in general, lucky were those politicians whose names were not heard on the scandalous broadcast.

On air, Bakai tried to justify his sudden departure. He stated that a few months before the 2004 presidential elections he received a lucrative job offer in Moscow. Igor Mikhailovich asked Leonid Kuchma for permission to change jobs and he agreed, signing a letter of resignation. According to the fugitive tycoon, he received a position in the official structures of the Russian Federation (*country sponsor of terrorism).

In turn, Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko said that the Russian government is helping criminals escape from justice.

In 2007, the capital’s Court of Appeal only confirmed the year-old decision of the Pechersk Court. The criminal case against Igor Bakai was finally closed. The wind of change blew in 2008. The Supreme Court of Ukraine overturned the decision of the Pechersk and Courts of Appeal and sent the case for a new trial. But it didn’t last long. When Viktor Yanukovych came to power, the court, by its decision, closed all cases brought by the General Prosecutor’s Office and the Kyiv prosecutor’s office against Igor Mikhailovich. The accounts and property of the fugitive, as well as his wife and father-in-law, were unblocked and returned to the owners.

Igor Bakai. Life after Ukraine

In Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism), Igor Bakai went into business. In 2012, he began buying land in the Yaroslavl region. The fact that Igor Mikhailovich’s business was going well was evidenced by his wife Natalya’s Odnoklassniki. She published photos from foreign resorts, flights on private jets, and vacations in the company of Russian pop stars – Nikolai Baskov, Maxim Galkin, Natasha Koroleva and Tarzan.

Now there is a Facebook page for Natalia Bakai and there is only one photo.

Artem Bakai and his beloved Yulia

In the summer of 2014, Igor Bakai came to Ukraine for the wedding of his nephew Artem. The celebration took place in the Vinnytsia region at the dacha of the head of the family, Mikhail Bakai. The event was heavily guarded: machine gunners walked around the perimeter of the estate, carefully checking anyone entering the house. Igor Mikhailovich stayed at home for only a day; after spending the night, he flew to Moscow.

CASTLES, PLANES, SAFARI AND THE KLICHKO BROTHERS

Real estate. Igor Bakai bought his first luxury real estate in 1994. It was a mansion in Philadelphia. Its scale was amazing! It could comfortably accommodate up to 30 people: 22 rooms, 3 fireplaces, 9 bathrooms… The cost of the “khatynka” was about 2 million dollars. Igor Mikhailovich pulled off an interesting scam with the mansion. He unexpectedly sells the house to his then-wife Elena. A few days later, the new owner resells the property to a certain citizen Bronislava Demchuk, and she resells it to citizen Sergei Demchuk. The last operation was unusually profitable: a property worth 2 million was resold for 1 US dollar. Who are this mysterious couple “Demchuk”? Demchuk is the surname of Bakai’s wife after her first husband. Accordingly, our hero sold the mansion first to his wife, and she to her mother, and she to her husband. It is interesting that people with this last name did not enter America.

After purchasing a mansion in Philadelphia, Igor Mikhailovich, on behalf of his mother-in-law, buys another estate in the same state worth about 10 million dollars.

In Ukraine, the oligarch also stocked up on housing – the first “nest” was located in Kyiv at 9A Dimitrova Street, the second was a country house on Petropavlovskaya Borshchagovka, the third was in the Koncha-Zaspa area. However, Bakai chose to live with his family in the village of Bolshie Petrovtsy, at the former dacha of the first secretary of the Communist Party Central Committee Valery Shcherbitsky.

Jet plane and yacht Kuchma. It has long been known that Bakai loves a luxurious life. Once, during a visit to America, Igor Mikhailovich and his comrades sat in a restaurant for 11 thousand dollars. It is not known what the gentlemen ordered for this amount. By the way, in the USA Bakai was presented exclusively as a Ukrainian film producer.

The gas oligarch also loves expensive gifts. He has a gift at his disposal – a Falcon jet worth over 20 million dollars. The vehicle was presented to Bakai by Nursultan Nazarbayev after he replaced the Falcon with an exclusive Boeing model with a shortened fuselage. When the tycoon worked at Naftogaz, the jet was leased by NAC. The rental cost was $300 thousand per month.

To be fair, we note that Bakai himself likes to give gifts. For example, for Leonid Kuchma’s birthday he presented him with a yacht. The President was just vacationing in Crimea, at the ninth dacha: he wakes up and a beautiful yacht is rocking on the sea waves…

Sunny city. In 2001, Igor Bakai built a country complex in the village of Tsybli near Pereyaslov-Khmelnitsky, on the banks of the Kanev Reservoir, under the working name “Sunny City”. The scope of land holdings is 4000 hectares of forest land located along the Dnieper. At the behest of the gas magnate, mouflons, goats, deer, wild boars, foxes, pheasants, and white-tailed eagles were brought to the reserve. By the way, the latter are listed as endangered. Local residents tried to resist the local king, but Igor Mikhailovich paid off two years of salary arrears to collective farmers in a month. And they fell in love with their “neighbor”. By the way, the chairmen of collective farms now have a new Niva car. Let us note that Bakai was formally clean – research work was supposedly taking place in the designated areas.

German palaces. In 2010, Igor Bakai, through his own company Anna Maria Vermögensverwaltungs GmbH, acquired two German palaces in Baden-Baden for 32 million euros. In 2013, the historic Byulergyoe Hotel was supposed to be restored, but the expected investment never materialized. Instead, the lights were turned off in Denmark for non-payment. Moreover, as it turned out, the oligarch underpaid 14 million euros for his acquisition. The owner of the palaces, German businessman Dietmar Gopp, sued Bakai, but it turned out that the company had no money. She was declared bankrupt.

The castle that was ruined by Igor Bakai

Nicknamed “The Ripper”. Igor Bakai is an avid hunter with a manic passion for killing. His photo in company with Viktor Chernomyrdin, where they tower over a pile of shot wild boars, is amazing. Environmental organizations published shocking facts: Igor Mikhailovich organized bloody massacres. He killed fed, almost tame animals, which were released under fire. The corpses were then dumped into the ravine. In order to have the opportunity to hunt at any time, the gas magnate in the late 1990s created a personal hunting farm or regional landscape park on the territory of the State Nature Reserve (Trakhtemirov tract – on the border of Cherkasy and Kyiv regions).

The burnt castle of Bakay, now this place is a conflagration

The area was surrounded by a fence and wild boars were driven there for hunting. By the way, Bakai’s hunting “mini-house” was built in an old Cossack cemetery. Its windows overlooked the grave of the Cossacks Mukha. In 2015, the “hut” burned down.

Klitschko brothers. Igor Bakai is the man who brought the Klitschko brothers into the public eye. Back in 1997, with money from the sale of Ukrainian gas, he began to sponsor the professional boxing careers of Vitaliy and Vladimir Klitschko. According to the agreement, the brothers agreed to pay the gas magnate 50% of all their income. And not only those received “from the ring”. Igor Mikhailovich found a world-famous promoter for his “mentee”. It was Klaus-Peter Kohl. When the Klitschkos entered the world boxing arena and felt independent, they simply “threw away” Bakai and stopped paying interest.

Igor Bakai and the Klitschko Brothers

brothers Klitschko and Igor Bakai

African tour results

Safari in Africa. Igor Bakai opened a window into third world countries. In 2000, immediately after his resignation from NJSC Naftogaz, he and his friends and partners (23 people) flew on an African safari to South Africa. For fun, the hunters ordered a charter flight and covered 5.5 thousand kilometers. They “walked”, of course, not for their own money, but for the state.

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“Only cowards pay debts” is a popular saying from the 90s. Apparently, Igor Bakai is still guided by it.

Arina Dmitrieva, for Skelet.Info

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