Andrey Malevany
In previous publications, we've told our readers extensively about those who seized and then developed land plots in the capital and the surrounding region. Now, we want to lift the lid on the high-ranking officials and show you the faces of those who helped them effortlessly "grab" hectares of land. It was their orders that handed over city property, parks, and natural areas to oligarchs, swindlers, and bribe-takers! Today, our "heroes" will be the new head of the State Environmental Inspectorate of Ukraine, Andriy Malevany, and his many colleagues, associates, and patrons.
Experienced corrupt officials rarely act alone, because "working" in tandem with others and "bringing it to" their superiors is much easier and safer. Moreover, the scale of corruption increases exponentially: what one corrupt official can't accomplish on their own, they can do with the help of accomplices from other departments and agencies. This is how corrupt organizations, popularly known as "mafias," arise. There are many of them: law enforcement mafias, tax and customs mafias, healthcare mafias, construction and road mafias, and even land mafias—the ones we'll discuss below.
Thieves of municipal property
Andrey Nikolaevich Malevany was born on December 16, 1981, in Kyiv, to Nikolai Ivanovich and Lidiya Ivanovna Malevany. He has an older brother, Yuri, born in 1975. Detailed information about his parents is lacking, and the maiden name of his wife, Elena Vadimovna, is also not disclosed. Therefore, it is difficult to trace the connections that led to Andrey Malevany's successful career in his family roots. However, Skelet.Org has information that his parents helped their son find the right people.
Malevany is one of the few current Ukrainian top officials with a technical background, not in economics, law, or the humanities. He graduated from the technical lyceum at the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute (KPI), and in 2003 from KPI itself, receiving an engineering degree in metrology and measurement technology. This suggests he chose this specialty for a reason, as if he was originally preparing for a career in land administration.
For some reason, Malevany is silent about his first job: his CV doesn't mention anything about what he did for almost two years after graduating. His career doesn't begin until 2005, as a manager at the Center for Assistance to Entrepreneurship LLC (EDRPOU 32594921). This is the name of a company operating in Kyiv that wholesales fuel (gas, petroleum products, etc.). This company is owned by Ihor Frezyuk and Vasyl Fedoriv, the owners of Ukrservis LLC (22193583), who are associated with the Galnaftogaz corporation of the notorious gasoline oligarch and corporate raider Vitaliy Antonov . Antonov owns the OKKO gas station chain!
Andrey Malevany: A Humble Beginning
In August 2006, Andriy Malevany left this lucrative job for a more promising one: he joined the civil service (or rather, returned to it), accepting the position of Deputy Head of the Privatization Department in the Department of Municipal Property and Entrepreneurship of the Shevchenkivskyi District Council. It's worth emphasizing that had this been his first civil service job, he would have first worked as a specialist (at least for a month), but Malevany was immediately promoted to a management position—suggesting that this wasn't his first time in government. Therefore, Malevany may be concealing this very fact in his biography. But why?
But the most important thing is that such key positions, which allowed for the plundering of city property (land, real estate, businesses), were, of course, not filled by the street—they were appointed by trusted people, with strong connections. So who "signed up" for 25-year-old Andryusha Malevanny? There's no definitive answer to this question; journalists have been left to speculate. It was speculated that Malevanny was placed in the job by his former boss, Antonov. But their relationship subsequently remained unclear, although members of the land mafia never forget the oligarchs they once worked for—and that's how they acquired lucrative real estate holdings in the capital.
What is known, however, is that Malevany immediately became a member of the corrupt team formed around Leonid Chernovetskyi , who had just then "seized" power in the capital. It was with these people that Andriy Malevany's subsequent "land" career was closely linked.
According to some Skelet.Org sources , Malevany owed his rise to the ranks of Kyiv officials to Artem Markovich Kadomsky (born 1975), a key figure in his inner circle. More specifically, to his father, Mark Aronovich Kadomsky. Kadomsky started out in the Soviet era speculating in furniture, then in the 90s "privatized" a workshop and founded the furniture company "KMK-1." After graduating from university in 1997, Artem Kadomsky worked for his father at the company for a year, and then his father got him a job at the Kyiv City State Administration, in the Kyiv City Land Resources Department, where he rose through the ranks from specialist to manager. According to sources, Mark Kadomsky was somehow connected to Andriy Malevany's parents. And look: just in 1998, when Artem Kadomsky got a job at the Land Management Department, Andrey Malevany enrolled at KPI to become a metrology engineer. Could it really be a coincidence?
Artem Kadomsky
Artem Kadomskyi's employment at the Kyiv City State Administration was facilitated by another man: Andriy Anatolyevich Ivanov , formerly Dirnberger, a Russian-Ukrainian oligarch and close business partner of Vasyl Khmelnytskyi , who carries a dark, bloody trail from the 90s. Ivanov and Khmelnytskyi had grand plans for land in Kyiv and the surrounding region, as well as for acquiring real estate in the capital—and they later realized these plans with the help of Artem Kadomskyi and Andriy Malevanyi. While the former provided them with vast tracts of park and recreational land, the latter was rising through the ranks of the Municipal Property Department in the Shevchenkivskyi district, helping them acquire "problematic" enterprises and properties for subsequent development.
Andrey Ivanov-Dirnberger
Malevany's second well-known patron is Oleksandr Yefimovich Lutsky, one of the living legends of Kyiv corruption. This man has grafted and stolen under every government, beginning his involvement in 2004 as an advisor to the Kyiv mayor. Initially, Lutsky advised San Sanych Omelchenko , and from 2006, Leonid Chernovetsky. At that time, he became a member of the Kyiv City Council and secretary of the land commission, and a year later, he became deputy chairman of the Kyiv City State Administration for land resources. Since then, he has been closely involved in land matters for a good 12 years; under Poroshenko, Lutsky even became the president's confidant for land matters in Tsarskoye Selo.
Alexander Lutsky
The third person closely associated with Andriy Malevanny is the controversial Serhiy Rudyk. As a grant-eater, national patriot, and member of Pora (and a close associate of the notorious Kaskiv), he rose to power after the first Maidan, also being elected to the Kyiv City Council in the spring of 2006. We also recall from the story of Vasyl Mokan that Pora then became a political springboard for the "brigade" of the late Kyiv "authority" Viktor Rybalko, whose former close associates included Vitali Klitschko and Artur Palatny . But this is only one of Rudyk's many connections—he was friends and "fruitfully collaborated" with everyone from Svoboda to the Party of Regions.
Sergey Rudyk
In the fall of 2006, Rudyk negotiated his way into the position of head of the State Committee on Nationalities and Migration – and immediately began making money by selling refugee status and residency permits to anyone who wanted them. Among those interested was the thief-in-law Ravshan Dzhaniev, implicated in the murder of another "authority figure," Ded Khasan. Dzhaniev was mockingly labeled a persecuted "representative of sexual minorities," but fearing retaliation and arrest in Russia more than shame, the thief-in-law agreed to be labeled a "pederast." Just six months later, Rudyk was scandalously ousted, and he found a job as deputy head of the Kyiv City State Administration, Chernovetskyi – despite Klitschko's ongoing conflict with Lyonya Kosmos. In short, this alone eloquently characterized Rudyk as an unprincipled, thoroughly corrupt bastard. Here we don’t even have to mention his conflict with Korban , which provoked one of the most high-profile political scandals in post-Maidan Ukraine.
Another member of Malevany's inner circle is Sergei Levtsov, his former boss and business partner. Even their work histories are very similar, except Levtsov started out in a different part of Kyiv. Levtsov still owns a dozen and a half companies, mostly construction ones, including six Stroygrupproektinvest No. 1-6 (Levtsov clearly has problems with creativity).
Sergey Levtsov
And rounding out this "inner circle" is Oleksandr Stalinolenovych Kachny, who in 2006 moved from his position as head of the State Department of Fisheries to the Kyiv Regional Council, becoming its deputy chairman. Then, from May 2010 to February 2014, Oleksandr Kachny served as chairman of the Kyiv Regional Council, catering to the Party of Regions and protecting all their land grabs. His role in these processes was so significant that Kachny is now considered Malevany's main patron—though, for some reason, the aforementioned members of the "land gang" are overlooked. Incidentally, Oleksandr Kachny is currently a member of parliament for the Opposition Platform - For Life faction (No. 35 on the list).
Alexander Kachny
As one hand washes the other
Now let's trace their combined careers to see the bigger picture. From 2006 to 2010, Andriy Malevany worked in the Department of Municipal Property Privatization of the Shevchenkivskyi District Council, rising to the position of its head. At the same time, his friend and partner, Serhiy Levtsov, started out as an assistant to Kyiv City Council member Oleksandr Lutskyi (secretary of the land commission), and was then appointed by him to a similar position in the Podilskyi District Council. Therefore, there is a theory that Lutskyi simultaneously placed Malevany and Levtsov in the privatization departments of two Kyiv districts. He may have had his own appointees in other districts of the capital as well. Levtsov advanced more quickly: in late 2008, he became deputy chairman of the district executive committee. Meanwhile, Lutskyi himself took a position under Chernovetskyi as an advisor, and then as deputy for land resources. Serhiy Rudyk was another of Chernovetskyi's deputy from 2007 to 2010. Artem Kadomskyi then became deputy head of the Kyiv City State Administration's Land Resources Department. That's how this gang-like team came together!
2010 brought some changes. Artem Kadomsky, finding common ground with the new government, rose to the position of First Deputy Chairman of the State Committee (since 2011, the Agency) of Ukraine for Land Resources. When Chernovetskyi finally left Kyiv in 2012, Oleksandr Lutskyi, now without his lucrative position, with Kadomskyi's help, was appointed Advisor to the Chairman of the State Land Committee, serving there until the second Maidan. Kadomskyi himself, however, remained in his position until the fall of 2014. And do you know why? Because Serhiy Rudyk, who was also left out of work after Chernovetskyi's departure and who in 2013 joined the All-Ukrainian Union "Svoboda" as the head of its faction secretariat in the Verkhovna Rada, became Chairman of the State Land Committee after the second Maidan (under Svoboda's quota) and retained Kadomskyi as his deputy. That's how one hand washes the other!
Serhiy Levtsov rose through the ranks during this period: he joined the Party of Regions, headed the Podil branch of Young Regions, and met and befriended Yanukovych's youngest son (Viktor, who died in 2015), with whom he later formed a joint venture. In the spring of 2011, he served as deputy chairman of the Vyshneve City Council, then became deputy chairman of the Kyiv-Svyatoshinsky District State Administration, was elected to the district council, and chaired the land commission. That same year, Andriy Malevany moved to the same Svyatoshinsky district as deputy general director for property rights registration at the Bureau of Technical Inventory.
In April 2012, Sergei Levtsov suddenly left for Mykolaiv, to take up the post of head of the regional State Land Committee. Andriy Malevany also fled the Svyatoshiyinsky district – he had worked for about a month as head of the privatization department at the Kyiv Municipal Property Fund, and then followed Levtsov to Mykolaiv, where he became his deputy. It's clear that Kadomsky facilitated their appointment, but why all the way to Mykolaiv, "in the middle of nowhere"? Because this move also took place with the help of Oleksandr Kachny, whose brother, Igor, lived in Mykolaiv and wielded considerable influence in the city and regional councils there. According to Skelet.Org sources , Igor Kachny had very important land-related matters to attend to in the region at the time: he needed to register large tracts of land in the name of his companies. Levtsov and Malevany completed this task within a few months, and by January 2013, Levtsov had returned to the capital to take up his position as head of the Main Directorate of the Kyiv State Land Agency. A month later, Andriy Malevany joined him again as deputy.
Sergey Varis, for Skelet.Org
CONTINUED: Andrey Malevany: Faces of Ukraine's Land Mafia. PART 2
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