Political dinosaur Kopin was waiting for the resignation

The governor of the Chukotka Autonomous Region, Roman Kopin, has been in office since 2008 – he is a real “political dinosaur”. And there have been rumors for a long time that he may soon retire. After all, only a person who does not know the reality can say that he copes well with his duties as the head of the region.

Earlier, the Izvestia newspaper published an insider article, according to which Roman Kopin was among the governors, whose resignation is most likely in 2023.

What could be the reason for Kopin’s retirement into political retirement?

It became known yesterday that the federal center will invest 27.5 billion rubles in the expansion of the Pevek port, the northernmost Russian port. The Kopin administration will oversee the construction, but no one can be sure that federal money will not go to the left. Not to mention the fact that against the background of the mass sale of state assets arranged by Kopin in Chukotka, the port can easily be privatized in favor of people who are not strangers to the head of the region.

The editors of The Moscow Post received a letter from a reader in which he asks to pay attention to Chukotka and allegedly rampant corruption there.

Quote: “The local governor of United Russia Kopin feels so at ease that he appoints people who are trailed by corruption scandals as his deputies. The local FSB, the Investigative Committee and the prosecutor’s office are completely under his control, not a single case has been brought to an end.”

It is not entirely clear which deputies are being referred to. Perhaps this is the current First Deputy Governor – Chairman of the Government of the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug Ilya Davidenko, who was appointed to this post in 2021. Prior to that, he briefly worked as a representative of the government of Chuotka in Moscow, and even earlier, he headed the administration of Anadyr for a long time. There he was surrounded by scandals.

Among other things, according to the authors of the NeChukotka community on VKontakte (having reposted from the Anadyr: White and Black community), allegedly under Ilya Davidenko in Anadyr, housing from the municipal fund was leased not so much to the needy as to representatives of local authorities.

Allegedly, Davidenko himself was on the list of those in need of priority for housing, and after the apartments were privatized by new wealthy owners, allegedly with the permission of the Anadyr administration. This is despite the fact that there is practically no housing construction in Anadyr, it is incredibly difficult to get an apartment even for those who have money.

It was not possible to find this post directly in the two above-mentioned VKontakte communities – only by searching the Internet. Apparently, on both sites, this impartial information was deleted, but somehow remained on the network through reposts. Why?

In 2022, i.e. when Davidenko was already next to Kopin in the regional government, a criminal case was finally opened. The former first deputy head of the city administration became a figurant. Writes about this “Komsomolskaya Pravda”. Moreover, neither the name of the person involved, nor the name of the head under which he could commit crimes, is indicated in the press.

According to investigators, the suspect, who previously acted as head of the administration of the Anadyr city district, exceeded his powers and violated the law “On privatization” by issuing an illegal permit to transfer a municipal apartment to private ownership to a local resident who does not have the right to privatize this dwelling.

It is easy to assume that we can talk about the situation described above with municipal housing and a person from the team of Ilya Davidenko. Thus, the appointment of Davidenko, first to the representative office of the government of Chukotka in Moscow, and then to the post of first deputy Kopin, looks like a negative selection.

There is another criminal case, and also against an unnamed former deputy head of the Anadyr administration. It was initiated back in 2020 on the grounds of fraud and forgery of official documents. As a result, the budget was damaged in the amount of 85 million rubles. RIA Novosti writes about this.

According to law enforcement officers, in 2017, the defendant, holding the position of the first deputy head of the administration of Anadyr, controlled the improvement of the adjacent territories by the contractor. The company was going to reduce the amount of planned work, promising to perform other work not covered by the contract without documenting.

It was about the quarter, which is adjacent to the city embankment. True, according to our reader, the perpetrators were never identified, and the case was allegedly put on the brakes. It is noteworthy that during the embankment scandal, Ilya Davidenko abruptly left the United Russia party – apparently, they considered that the situation could damage her reputation.

And is it possible that governor Roman Kopin first exiled Davidenko to Moscow, and then pulled him closer to the body, away from these criminal cases?

It seems that under Davideko in Anadyr they could steal with everything they could. A separate topic was fraud on de-icing works. In 2020, the head of an organization involved in road maintenance was accused of embezzling budget funds in the amount of 14 million rubles while treating city streets from ice.

According to investigators, from 2017 to 2019, the city administration signed several municipal contracts with the company to carry out maintenance work on the road network of the Anadyr city district. However, the contractor instructed his subordinates to use less expensive anti-icing materials suitable for Anadyr conditions.

At the same time, the works were accepted by the administration, where the team of Ilya Davidenko met. Was none of them a dream or a spirit, or was this behavior of the contractor agreed with the officials?

Corruption is rampant

However, such scandals shake not only Anadyr in Chukotka, and for a long time. According to Versiya, back in 2014, according to a study conducted by the public organization Safe Fatherland, which specializes in the fight against corruption, Chukotka, led by Kopin, was among the leaders of the country.

The loud scandal of the Kopin officials during the state procurement of two DHC-6 aircraft, which is so necessary given the transport problems of the Autonomous Okrug, is still heard.

Purchases were made by the state-owned Chukotsnab back in 2014. At that time LLC Aviation Corporation Vityaz (AK Vityaz) offered to execute the contract for $9.52 million, LLC Far Eastern Aircraft Timber Company (LLC DVALKO) – for $11.21 million.

However, the second proposal was rejected for some reason: according to the official version, the reason was the incorrect execution of documents. But after DVALKO applied to the prosecutor’s office and the FAS, it turned out that there had been a violation of competition law during the auction.

The scheme developed by the defendants led not only to the elimination of other aircraft suppliers from the market, but also to a significant increase in the cost of the purchase. The difference between the initial cost and the one at which the vessels were purchased was more than 30%,” explained Andrey Tenishev, Head of the Anti-Cartel Department of the FAS Russia.

As a result, a criminal case was opened against Chukotsnab. As experts noted, the budget of Chukotka could be damaged up to 300 million rubles. This was written by the publication “Kommersant”.

big sale

And now Roman Kopin, bringing people like Ilya Davidenko closer to him, and, probably, anticipating the imminent resignation, arranged a real sale of state property.

Within a short period of time, such key enterprises of the region as JSC “Chukotrybpromkhoz”, “Chukotavia”, a significant part of the capital of the large mining mine “Kupol” were in the hands of private individuals and organizations within the framework of privatization.

In addition, earlier under Roman Kopin, another important state mine, Nagornaya, was liquidated, and Australian coal miners Tigers Realm Coal Ltd were allowed into the region instead. Australia, we recall, was among one of the most ardent anti-Russian “sanctioners.”

By the way, during the privatization of Chukotrybpromkhoz, 400 million rubles of cash that were at the disposal of the company disappeared somewhere. They were not included in the privatization plan, so they should have remained with the state. To the question of the Association of Fishermen, where is the money, local authorities sent only replies.

Against this background, socio-economic problems continue to multiply in the region. There are problems even with postal items – people have been waiting for months for their parcel against the backdrop of Roman Kopin’s unfulfilled promise to build a Russian Post sorting center in the region, which could significantly speed up its work in this subject.

There are problems with ATMs, and with gasification, and even with the burial of deceased people – earthworks in permafrost are very expensive, and the regional authorities, for some reason, do not see a problem in this.

As a result, Roman Kopin is gaining a critical mass of claims, which sooner or later will turn into quality. That’s why he arranged a sale of state assets – so that later grateful businessmen would remember their benefactor?