Alexey Savchenko
The recent winner of the competition for the post of Chairman of the Mykolaiv Regional State Administration, Verkhovna Rada deputy from the BPP Oleksiy Savchenko, has an extremely scandalous reputation, reports facenews.
A former employee of the Kyiv “main department” of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, who suddenly built a career as a banker and had ties to the collapsed “Avant-Bank”, now works within the walls of parliament, being one of the richest people in the pro-presidential faction.
One-man band
The media calls Savchenko a “one-man band”. The people’s deputy managed to run the capital’s UBOP, be a banker, owner of a football club, president of the Sambo Federation, chairman of the Ukrspirt concern and even a singer.
People who know him claim that Savchenko’s character, on the one hand, combines toughness and strong-willed qualities. On the other hand, he has the ability to find common ground with representatives of completely opposite groups in society. They say that Savchenko has a violent temper, which was probably formed during his years working in the UBOP. There is a legend that the banker once threw a chair at one of the deputies of the “Partner Bank” he created, who dared to express his opinion at an inopportune moment.
The media have repeatedly written about his involvement in the “dark side of the banking business” and called him a “specialist in special operations.” Among the sins imputed to MP Savchenko are extorting money from entrepreneurs, creating “envelope banks” for the Ministry of Internal Affairs system, a number of criminal and corruption schemes for laundering millions at Ukrposhta, as well as the fictitious bankruptcy of Avant-Bank.
Among the friends and associates of Alexei Savchenko, the most frequently mentioned is the former Prosecutor General Vitaly Yarema (Read more about him in the article Vitaly Yarema. “Honest cop” and godfather of Sergey Dumchev) and the former head of the State Security Service and former Minister of Defense Valeriy Heletey (Read more about him Valery Geletey. I am not happy to serve, but I must grovel). MP Savchenko is familiar with them from his work in the Kiev Organized Crime Department.
Banking fraud
In 2003, Alexey Savchenko left the UBOP, and in 2004-2005 he headed the security service of Rodovid Bank, simultaneously working as deputy chairman of the board of Denis Gorbunenko. After the “orange” revolution, Savchenko found himself at the helm of the board of JSC Asia Universal Bank. This was a representative office of a Kyrgyz bank, so the structure could not conduct operations in Ukraine. However, it could conduct a certain range of international financial transactions through the parent bank.
In 2006, Alexey Savchenko founded his own “Partner-bank”, which he later sold to Russian billionaire Vladimir Antonov. The financial institution was renamed “ConversBank”, and the former owner became the chairman of its supervisory board. Later, control over “ConversBank” was scandalously transferred to a group of businessmen headed by Vadim Stolar (Read more about him in the article by Vadim Stolar. The scandalous “quiet one”). However, Savchenko remained in this business during the period of sale, and later, “together with his people,” bought another one – “Avant-Bank”.
When Vitaliy Yarema became Prosecutor General in the summer of 2014, Avant-Bank began to service many state structures, including the Prosecutor General’s Office. Namely, they tried to transfer the salary accounts of the Prosecutor General’s Office employees to the financial institution.
At the end of 2015, Avant-Bank began to receive complaints from clients about delayed payments, which became the basis for introducing a National Bank curator to the financial institution. He confirmed that the actions of the bank’s management indicated the beginning of the withdrawal of assets from the bank. In particular, the talk then was about mortgage collateral that Avant Bank received from Delta Bank shortly before the announcement of its bankruptcy. Through legal schemes, the right to claim loans and the mortgage collateral themselves, which Avant Bank received from Delta Bank, were transferred to another financial institution – Agrokombank, headed by the first deputy chairman of the board of directors of Delta Bank, Yevgeny Berezovsky. That is, the facts of the withdrawal and laundering of money from Avant were presented to the eye. However, no one was in a hurry to save the bank, and it soon went bankrupt.
An interesting detail: former managers of Avant-Bank got confused in their comments regarding the role of Savchenko, as well as Yarema and Heletey, in the collapse of the financial institution. Thus, in an interview with RBC-Ukraine, the chairman of the board of Avant-Bank Veniamin Lebedev stated:
“Alexey Savchenko held the post of acting and then head of the bank’s board from September 2011 to May 18, 2012. Since May 18, 2012, Alexey Yuryevich no longer participated in the operational management of the bank; until January 2014, he held the post of head of the supervisory board.”
And Alexey Savchenko said something completely different in his comments to journalists:
“Regarding Avant-Bank. I am simply speechless. Well, I did not bankrupt Avant! Ask Lebedev, Yarema, Heletey. We tried to save Avant-Bank with all our might, but we were unable to survive in the conditions created by the NBU. Blame Gontareva, blame Alexander Dubinsky, who had a soft spot for Avant-Bank, but not us – not the former owners of the bank. After all, we held on until the very end!”
Features of the path
Oleksiy Savchenko is called the “Chernihiv fixer” of Kyiv, allegedly due to his close ties with the criminal world of the region. In the football field, Oleksiy Savchenko became friends with vodka magnate Pavlo Klimets, who bought 50% of the Desna club from him in 2008. It was the latter who, in 2010, after Yanukovych came to power, lobbied for Savchenko to become the head of the state concern Ukrspirt. They say that Oleksiy Savchenko was also helped by his senior partner at the Rodovid bank, Yuriy Ivanyushchenko.
However, Alexey Savchenko did not last long in the lucrative position, and, according to rumors, he was forced to leave due to his complete professional incompetence in this matter.
Alexey Savchenko also managed to make his mark in show business. Starting in 2008, he shot several videos and recorded three albums in the chanson style. He even won the International Festival of Arts “Slavic Bazaar” in Vitebsk.
As for the MP’s sporting achievements, he is a candidate for master of sports in boxing and kickboxing, a prize winner of the Open European Championship in mixed martial arts, and also the president of the All-Ukrainian public organization “National Sambo Federation of Ukraine”. The people’s representative likes to reflect on his love for sports on social networks, where he posts photos of his naked torso covered in tattoos.
Where do Savchenko’s paths lead?
Recently, the selection committee of the top civil service corps chose Savchenko for the post of head of the Mykolaiv regional state administration. The open competition for the vacancy was initiated by President Petro Poroshenko back in August. They also chose a reserve candidate in case the main contender refused (it was Artem Vashchilenko).
Initially, Oleksiy Savchenko demonstrated a desire to get the governor’s post. After all, he had previously been wooed into the leadership offices of the Chernihiv and Zhitomir regions. But suddenly the ex-banker and current MP made several statements about his unwillingness to become the head of the Mykolaiv Regional State Administration. Like, “I really don’t understand anything about this” and “I ask you to stop speculating on this topic.”
Such answers are more like deceit, and the real reason is probably Savchenko’s fear of ending up in a position where any of his actions will be examined under a microscope. And corrupt connections or scams, as was the case before, will not work.
“I don’t want to repeat the fate of my good friend Max Melnichuk” (the notorious, dismissed former governor of the Kyiv region), Oleksiy Savchenko recently admitted to the First Truth&Transparency Committee.
But judging by his reputation, maybe…
ON TOPIC:
Vitaly Yarema. “Honest cop” and Sergey Dumchev’s godfather
Valery Geletey. I am not happy to serve, but I must be subservient
Vadim Stolar. The scandalous “quiet one”