Nikolay Gavrilenko. The formula for success of the Donetsk “oilman”. PART 1

Nikolai Gavrilenko is little known to the general public. In 2015, he was quietly appointed head of Ukrtransnafta, the largest operator of Ukraine’s oil pipeline system, after a high-profile scandal involving the dismissal of Igor Kolomoisky’s protégé, Oleksandr Lazorko.

The promised deoligarchization has finally begun. Nikolai Gavrilenko has become the country’s hope. True, no one “noticed” that the newly minted “oilman” stood at the origins of the scandalous Donetsk structure “VIK OIL” and was a protégé of the famous criminal authority Zhigan Taktashev. He is the owner of the Formula gas station chain and companies that consistently win million-dollar tenders.

Skelet.Info tells the story of the success of a Donetsk businessman under the new government.

Ukrtransnafta Saves Itself from Privat

When the passions of Maidan died down a bit, the “era” of lustration began in the country. The authorities, who promised “a new life”, took up the dispossession of the oligarchs of the Yanukovych period. The first to fall under the hammer was the odious Igor Kolomoisky. The conflict between Benya and Petro Poroshenko reached a new level. An active confrontation began around the chair of the head of Ukrtransnafta.

Ukrtransnafta was controlled for a long time by Igor Kolomoisky and his Privat group. Despite the fact that 100% of the shares belong to the state through NAK Naftogaz Ukraine. The director of the company was Benya’s protégé – Alexander Lazorko.

Director of Ukrtransnafta, Kolomoisky’s protégé – Alexander Lazorko

Why does the oligarch need Ukrtransnafta? The company is the main operator of the oil pipeline system in Ukraine. It includes three enterprises – Prydniprovsk Main Oil Pipelines (southeast of Ukraine), Druzhba Main Oil Pipelines (northwest of Ukraine) and Southern Main Oil Pipelines (south of Ukraine). Russian oil is supplied to Ukrainian refineries and exported to Europe through all of these pipelines. Igor Kolomoisky concentrated the “profitable business” in his hands – he pumped cheap oil through the operator to his refineries: Nadvirna, Drohobych and Kremenchug. It should be noted that only the last oil refinery was operating, the rest served as reservoirs for storing “black gold”.

Benya could have reveled in impunity for a long time, even under the new government, if he had not decided to “reprivatize” (in common parlance, “squeeze out”) the assets of the powers that be – Rinat Akhmetov and Dmitry Firtash. The response from the oligarchs was not long in coming. Moreover, it was the most opportune time for him: the activists wanted to lustrate everyone.

Showdown in Ukrtransnafta

March 19, 2015 is a black date for Igor Valerievich. On this day, the supervisory board of PJSC Ukrtransnafta dismissed Oleksandr Lazorko from his post. The audit commission’s investigation revealed embezzlement. With Lazorko’s light hand (under Kolomoisky’s influence), the company signed unfavorable contracts for oil transportation with PJSC Sintez Oil (controlled by the Privat group) and pumping raw materials to the Ukrtatnafta plant at reduced rates. As a result, the state lost UAH 550 million. Also in 2014, Lazorko ordered 650 thousand tons of process oil to be pumped out of pipelines at the Privat refinery for storage at a cost of several million hryvnia per day. After the exposure, NAK appointed Yuriy Miroshnik to temporarily act as acting director.

And then a showdown in the style of the 90s began. Miroshnik arrived at his new place of work accompanied by unknown people, allegedly employees of Alpha. Lazorko barricaded himself in the office. The officials jostled, broke windows and doors, but the conflict did not escalate into a “hot stage”.

The issue was transferred to the legal plane. The Verkhovna Rada adopted amendments to the law, which concerned the reduction of the quorum for holding a meeting of shareholders of Ukrtransnafta from 60% to 50% + 1 share. Igor Kolomoisky himself arrived at the company’s office with a dozen machine gunners.

Energy Minister Volodymyr Demchyshyn rushed to save the situation. But he left the building half an hour later. It is known that the angry Kolomoisky promised to send the dissenters to the ATO. So the officials decided not to push Benya to the limit.

For more than six months, Ukrtransnafta was managed by managers with the prefix “acting”. Everyone who was not too lazy had this status – former SBU employee Yuriy Miroshnik, businessman Sergey Sukalo, former head of the pricing policy department of PJSC Roman Sidorak.

In the fall of 2015, the shareholders of the state monopoly on oil transit via pipelines appointed a director – Mykola Gavrilenko. He won a public competition from NAK Naftogaz of Ukraine.

Skeleton.Info tells the story of a man who himself was guilty of corruption and was not afraid to head the most controversial industry in Ukraine.

Nikolay Gavrilenko. From “ours”, from “Donetsk”

Gavrilenko Nikolay Nikolaevich was born on June 29, 1969 in the city of Maryinka, Donetsk region. He received his higher education at the Donetsk State University of Economics and Trade, specializing in “Enterprise Economics”.

It is known from open sources that Nikolai Gavrilenko began his career in the VIK OIL gas station chain. Since 1995, he has worked in management positions and was one of three VIK OIL shareholders. At present, Nikolai Nikolaevich has more than 20 years of management experience in the oil industry. These terse lines are clearly “licked” for the official biography of an official. Skeleton.Info found interesting facts about the life of the head of Ukrtransnafta.

Donetsk racketeering “led” Nikolay Gavrilenko into business. It all started in 1992, when a young and promising student of a Donetsk university received a diploma. He did not return to his native Maryinka. Moreover, in Donetsk the young man made several interesting, and most importantly, promising acquaintances with aspiring businessmen. Skeleton.Info reconstructs the entire chain of events and dives into the criminal wars of Donbass.

In 1992, Donetsk resident Igor Filippenko opened his own business – the firm VIK LTD. The entrepreneur registered it at his home address (Donetsk, Konstitutsii Boulevard 1, Apt. 220).

Igor Filipenko

Filippenko belonged to the local elite in those years. He owned trading kiosks and was covered by Janos Krantz, a representative of the old generation of authorities who was shot at the end of 1992. Krantz had a direct relationship with the VIK LTD company, but after his death the newly created structure passed into the hands of another authority – Zhigan Taktashev.

Zhigan Khamitovich (Evgeniy Nikolevich) Taktashev

The general public and the press know him under the name of Evgeny Taktashev (or even Taktashov), the late CEO of FC Shakhtar CJSC and Rinat Akhmetov’s right hand man. Due to the confusion with the last name and first name, Taktashev’s role in the Donetsk wars was forgotten. At the same time, he was one of the closest henchmen of Alik Grek (Bragin), who introduced him to his distant relative Igor Akhmetov, and then to his younger brother Rinat.

Filipenko, with the support of Zhigan Taktashev, was engaged in “protection” of kiosks through his company, and a little later, service stations for “his own” came into his sphere of activity. At the station, they “patched up” cars that had been damaged in gangster showdowns, and also changed the numbers. The service station was covered by the company OOO “VIK-T”.

In 1995, Filipenko and his “roof” expanded their business with oil, or more precisely, the monopolization of fuel supplies to auto companies. An interesting fact: if it were not for Tatyana Bakhteeva, Taktashev, and then Rinat Akhmetov, would have been left without a profitable business. In general, the very idea of ​​monopolizing fuel supplies belongs to the famous Donetsk raider Vladislav Dreger, whose activities are associated with the capture of the bus transportation market (OAO Dopas, Transportny Soyuz Donbassa, Avtoekspress, Magistral, OOO Avtomagistrali Donbassa, OOO Donetskie Vokzal). Having taken over all the city bus stations, Dreger realized that the best way to control them was through fuel. He told Alimzhan Bakhteev about this – Tatyana Bakhteeva’s husband, who worked for the company OAO Dopas, which was engaged in bus transportation. Bakhteeva conveyed the information to her friend Raisa Taktasheva. And she, in turn, whispered it to her husband Zhigan Taktashev.

Tatyana Bakhteeva, Vladislav Dreger

Taktashev did not see any potential in Filipenko for the oil business. So he brought a young guy named Nikolai to his protégé and said that he would head the new direction. Yes, the Donetsk authority brought in his “six-man” Nikolai Gavrilenko, the future big businessman and head of Ukrtransnafta. Nikolai Gavrilenko became the director of a subsidiary of VIK-T called VIK OIL LLC, and a co-founder of this structure.

“VIK OIL” started selling oil products. In a matter of months, it became one of the main “gas stations” of Donetsk clans.

Nikolay Gavrilenko. Time to Make Money

In 2002, the UTN-Vostok company appeared, consisting of two structures – VIK OIL LLC and Vostok LLC. It united and began to develop 118 gas stations in the Donetsk, Dnepropetrovsk and Kyiv regions. Among the founders of the first company were three – Igor Filippenko, Nikolai Gavrilenko and Anatoly Gavrilchenko – a friend of Filippenko. The owners of the second structure were the same, plus Vyacheslav Zimenkov – a childhood friend of Gavrilchenko and Sergey Petrov – a good acquaintance of Filippenko.

When in November 2002, the governor of Donetsk region Viktor Yanukovych became prime minister, Donetsk business moved to Kyiv. According to the then trend, “their own” could easily transfer money to offshore accounts. Thus, ZAO VIKOIL was created with the legal address: Kyiv, Stolichnoe Shosse, 98. Its founders and owners were Turitella Corporation (86%), registered in the British Virgin Islands, Ukrnaftotorgservis (4%), VIK OIL LLC (9%) and VIK Sistem LLC (1%). Nikolai Gavrilenko remained at the head of the structure, which began to control UNT-Vostok and VIK OIL LLC.

Why did the businessmen need to create a closed joint-stock company? This only means one thing: the structure now has one owner, who covered up his name as Turitella Corporation. We won’t keep you in suspense for long: the company was run by none other than Zhigan Taktashev, who decided to change the structure’s owners to his Donetsk friends. Sources Skeleton.Info Another person, Andrey Adamovsky, is associated with Turitella.

Thanks to Taktashev’s light hand, in 2003, Donetsk businessman Timur Valitov joined UTN-Vostok, which at that time already owned about a hundred gas stations. He became one of the main shareholders, receiving 80% of the shares. Igor Filippenko was content with second place in business. Timur Valitov is a deputy of the Donetsk Regional Council, owner of the Patriot automobile club and son-in-law of Tatyana Bakhteyeva. It should be noted that Valitov was listed as an employee of the Interregional Investment Union State Enterprise. This holding company united all of Zhigan Taktashev’s companies in the mid-90s.

The new owner ensured that VIK OIL began selling oil products from the Kremenchug Oil Refinery to Ukrtatnafta.

The Donetsk people’s business went swimmingly for 2 years. But already in 2005, after the Orange Revolution, the mafia suffered a fiasco.

In the spring of 2005, “dear friends” under the slogan “Prison for bandits!” arrested the chairman of the Donetsk regional council Boris Kolesnikov. He was accused of taking over shares of the fashionable Donetsk shopping center “White Swan” by extortion. Realizing that things were getting hot, Zhigan Taktashev and Igor Filippenko went on the run. A year later, Taktashev suddenly died (as they said in the obituary of FC Shakhtar, where, however, he was called in the “Russian transcription” Yevgeny Nikolaevich), and Filippenko decided not to tempt fate and moved to Canada for permanent residence.

However, Filippenko went abroad with a clear conscience. Under the watchful guidance of Timur Valitov, he began changing the owners of the businesses of VIK OIL LLC and UTN-Vostok. The latter structure was moved offshore, registered to INFOTEX EN.VI (Anguilla, British West Indies, South Hill, Heywood House, 294). Another company, Artekst Intro S.A., was also registered at the same address. In 2006, six months before Taktashev’s death, the main asset of VIK OIL LLC shares was transferred to it. The second most important share was held by Timur Valitov. Loyal managers Vyacheslav Zimenkov, Anatoly Gavrilchenko and Nikolai Gavrilenko had “little things”.

Arina Dmitrieva, for Skelet.Info

CONTINUATION: Gavrilenko Nikolay. The formula for success of the Donetsk “oilman”. PART 2

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