The Office of the President plans to take assets from Firtash and Kolomoisky through a robbery
Do the new people who will own Firtash and Kolomoisky's assets have measures to prevent corruption?
Recently, Firtash's assets are being taken away by the flows of oblgas. It's uncertain how long this will last, but it's a fact, according to ZN.
The state has decided to take the pipelines from the regional gas companies of Firtash and other small players and transfer them to the operation of LLC Gas Distribution Networks of Ukraine, which is owned by the state-owned Naftogaz of Ukraine. This is formalized by the Resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers No. 1335 of November 25, 2022.
This action is due to the war and deep distrust of the pro-Russian oligarch. There is a concern that he may engage in blackmail, especially if he is put in an American prison. There's a possibility that he may cut off the gas supply in Ukraine to retaliate against the United States, so that Zelensky requests Biden not to intervene.
Therefore everything seems to be logical and justified.
However, there's one thing to consider.
Regional gas companies have consistently profited from a simple scheme. For years, they did not pay the state-owned Operator of the Gas Transportation System of Ukraine for gas, but collected money from consumers. This resulted in accumulating debts, which were occasionally written off through agreements with the authorities. Currently, the accumulated debts amount to UAH 17 billion.
The nuance is that oblgas companies have only one option to pay off these debts – by collecting money from consumers for the gas delivery through the pipelines. Now that the pipelines are being taken away from them, they lose the theoretical opportunity to pay their debts to the state. This means it becomes a bad debt, and the state will likely never receive UAH 17 billion, which could have been used to maintain the gas transmission network and other energy security measures.
The decision seems illogical because if the state's goal is to take the pipelines from Firtash, they could work on settling the debt with the state-owned company OGTSU. It shouldn't matter to the state which pocket the proceeds from gas distribution end up in.
And the difference may be this.
OGTSU has drawn attention from international lenders in recent years, so there's not much happening in terms of withdrawing money through tenders.
The money withdrawal from the new LLC will be completely opaque. It will not go through tenders in Prozorro because our legislators have decided that if your founder is a company owned by the state, then you are not considered a customer under the law. This allows you to buy from whoever you want, without showing your prices, and to manipulate Firtash's schemes related to gas supplies.
So the only thing that can stop is the political will of the first persons of the state, expressed in the attention of law enforcement agencies. Or a controlled and transparent withdrawal of money from the company. Such that the head of LLC “Gas Distribution Networks of Ukraine” Denis Mirgorodsky or the head of NJSC “Naftogaz of Ukraine” Oleksiy Chernyshov, or their roof in the office of President Andriy Yermak, could not even look at these billions without being noticed by Ukraine's international partners and donors.
Lawyer Denis Mirgorodsky (Dynasty law firm) has been appointed Director of OOOshka. He is a very well-known lawyer in Dnipro, he has defended many business stars in local courts, including the companies of Vadim Ermolaev and Igor Nikonov. It looks like he went to the team of the president's office for a new challenge.
Of course, his Dnipro origin gave rise to rumors that Kolomoisky's man was sitting on the oblgas.
But now it looks unlikely. There are already many signs that the toxic oligarch is being squeezed out of Ukrnafta’s flows. After Yermak’s people entered the supervisory board of the company, it was transferred to the Ministry of Defense, and it was decided to dismiss top managers who had been responsible for the enrichment of Kolomoisky for many years – Kartashov, Kusch, Lunev.
Firtash and Kolomoisky will rip off the Office of the President
Also, scratch cards (coupons), Avias fuel cards and the Energy mobile application are no longer valid at Ukrnafta gas stations. These are also parts of Kolomoisky's web around a semi-state company.
Of course, all these things can be rolled back after the victory. To return Kolomoisky's people to management, because they are not imprisoned, but only fired. Return Kolomoisky's cards, because the program at gas stations is not being liquidated, but “temporarily suspended” (this is exactly what the press release of the updated Ukrnafta says). Return the company from the Ministry of Defense to the old shareholders.
That is, it cannot be ruled out that after the war Ukrnafta will be returned at least partially to Kolomoisky “washed and repainted”. That is, with “solved” problems of criminal proceedings and cleared of debt obligations. But at least one thing can be said today: Kolomoisky is losing control of Ukrnafta’s cash flows in the fuel sector right now.
Yuriy Nikolov
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