Oleg Deripaska pulls too hard with Ust-Luga

“RUSAL” of Oleg Deripaska is going to invest 400 billion rubles in the development of “Ust-Luga”. We are talking about port and alumina infrastructure. As it was announced at SPIEF, the government of the Leningrad region will provide assistance.

The project raises a lot of questions – here is the redistribution of the market, and the real possibility of implementation without the involvement of public funds, and the security of future production workers.

Details – in the material of the correspondent of The Moscow Post.

Difficile

Negotiations with Deripaska about the project began more than 15 years ago, when his En + signed an agreement to build an alumina terminal for 4.5 million tons per year and an aluminum terminal for 3.5 million tons. Deripaska’s company had to buy the land, but this never happened.

And in 2013, the then general director of the Ust-Luga port management company, Svetlana Makarova, said, in fact, that the oligarch was ignoring their requests, and the issue was in limbo. Apparently, the benefits that Deripaska wanted for his project could not meet expectations. So he “bristled”. And the fact that the agreement has now been signed may indicate that he has managed to “fill his own worth”.

Surely state investments will flow into the project, and if they don’t, we won’t see alumina. It is strange, but there are people who believe that Deripaska will not even build what is profitable for him, without a penny of state investment and minimizing his own costs.

The businessman is used to doing something similar with his other ventures, despite the wide coverage in the media of his emphatically philanthropic inclinations to implement projects at his own expense. He even buys aluminum for the operating RUSAL with public funds, Forbes claimed.

In recent years, we have only heard from Oleg Vladimirovich about subsidies from the state. In 2018, he “blamed” the sanctions so that he would be given benefits, raised the tariffs of networks for the population.

In 2015, “hands on” with Dmitry Pumpyansky’s “Sinara”, he turned to Denis Manturov with a request to include specialized freight cars and Lastochka electric trains in the list of rolling stock, the buyers of which can receive a subsidy from the budget. By the way, “Lastochki” and so are more expensive than conventional trains – for consumers.

And yet, they are in demand, because they deliver to the right place faster, so sometimes people in them, like in a jar of sprats. And, nevertheless, why not collect “bribes” also from the state?

At the same time, with a light hand, it may turn out to be from the obligations assumed – as was the case, for example, with the long-suffering Boguchanskaya hydroelectric power station. In 2006, RUSAL undertook to complete its construction, and by 2009 an accident occurred there, the consequences of which had to be eliminated. And “RUSAL” probably decided that he had nothing more to do there. Without government money, of course.

As a result, the state poured about 30 billion rubles into it, and the HPP was completed. What is most interesting, it was primarily to be built in order to provide energy for Mr. Deripaska’s production plants. That is, he created a hydroelectric power station with state money – for himself! Audacity second happiness?

People as “consumables”

Oleg Deripaska’s people save even on their own employees. In 2011, it got to the point that the then governor of the Leningrad region, Valery Serdyukov, intervened and demanded that the oligarch raise the wages of ordinary hard workers, three deaths of workers at Deripaska’s enterprises, to adequate levels.

According to “Zaks.ru”, with the growth of labor productivity and an increase in the production of basic types of products, the salary of the enterprise’s employees was 1.4 times lower than the average regional level and 20% lower than the average monthly earnings in the manufacturing industries of the Boksitogorsky district!

The fact that the oligarch “loves and appreciates” the workers of his enterprises is also well illustrated by the situation in 2012, when, due to the upcoming mass layoffs, people even went to unsanctioned rallies. And again, those who are “higher” had to intervene in the matter. The prosecutor’s office sent Oleg Vladimirovich a warning about the inadmissibility of violating the law. But he just wanted to redistribute cash flows! People in this case are just consumables…

Transfer at public expense

But back to the situation in Ust-Luga. Next to the site on which Deripaska will (or not) be built, there is land that previously belonged to the company of Ilya Traber, a reputable businessman known in certain circles as Antivakr. He received this territory after the arrested Valery Izraylit. There was even talk of a raider takeover.

Later, he sold these assets to the structure of Gazprom and Arkady Rotenberg. Now Traber’s interests in Ust-Luga are traced through the companies BSMZ and Baltic Methanol, which literally in April of this year signed an agreement on co-financing the construction of a complex for the production of methanol and nitrogen fertilizers and a marine terminal for transshipment of liquid chemical cargoes in the port.

Recently, The Moscow Post talked about the fact that Ilya Traber could have come into conflict with the head of Transmashholding, Andrey Bokarev, over the capacities of the Petersburg Oil Terminal. So, the 90s are not over, and Deripaska’s entry into this market may mean another redistribution.

As we know, the oligarch does not work very well with other entrepreneurs. Take, for example, the “smoldering” conflict with the head of Norilsk Nickel, Vladimir Potanin, which we have repeatedly covered in detail for more than a decade. As a result of which, a large and important enterprise for the state suffers, torn by contradictions.

The intensity of passions is serious. Whether still will be in Ust-Luga. Most likely, the budget and employees of enterprises will suffer from what awaits us, but whether it will be possible to properly implement the idea that has been “spinning” under the noses of the government of the Leningrad Region for 15 years is an open question.