Artur Gerasimov | Petro Poroshenko
Petro Poroshenko suffers reputational losses by bringing Artur Gerasimov closer to him.
The 2014 Euromaidan revolution became a veritable "social elevator," elevating many people who were literally nobody just yesterday to the pinnacle of power in Ukraine. During their tenure in power, many of them acquired scandalous reputations, which, however, does not prevent them from remaining influential. And sometimes, a scandalous reputation even "helps" them advance their careers.
An example of this is the marketer, unsuccessful candidate for the Ukrainian parliament in 2012, and today the head of the faction of the ruling Petro Poroshenko Bloc in the Verkhovna Rada and a confidant of the head of state - Artur Gerasimov.
Artur Gerasimov. From Marketer to "Shakhov's Team"
According to publicly available data and his biography, Artur Gerasimov, born in 1972 in the urban-type settlement of Reshetylivka in the Poltava region, received his undergraduate education in 1995, graduating from the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Faculty of Sociology and Psychology, after which he spent two years in graduate school. While still a student in 1994, he became deputy director of the Ukrainian Marketing Group (UMG), and after completing his graduate studies in 1997, he became its CEO. The company specializes in marketing research.
For 15 years, no one had heard much about Artur Gerasimov, except perhaps in very narrow circles. However, in 2012, he gained widespread, if not scandalous, notoriety as a member of "Shakhov's team." It's possible, however, that it was precisely this notoriety that subsequently helped him reach new heights in life.
The year 2012 was remembered by many during the Verkhovna Rada election campaign for the emergence and activities of the so-called "Sergey Shakhov's team" in the Luhansk and part of the Donetsk regions. This group was led by Sergey Shakhov , a controversial businessman, former member of the Luhansk Regional Council, and notorious figure as Stakhanov's shadow boss , who decided to enter parliament himself and install his own people.
The election campaign of Shakhov's team members was quite unique due to its technology, nicknamed the "fifty-kopeck piece technology," as they carried out mass distributions of cash in amounts of 50 hryvnia.
The essence of the technology, or "system," as it was also called, was as follows: a person filled out a questionnaire and received 50 hryvnias in "material assistance" and a booklet containing 30 tear-off barcodes, each of which entitled them to receive the next "fifty kopecks." Formally, the person owed nothing, except that they could bring others "to the team," who would also receive money. Of course, in exchange, the recipients of the fifty kopecks were expected to become active supporters and campaigners for "Shakhov's team," which would entail a return in the form of votes received on election day.
The "system" immediately catches the eye, resembling a financial pyramid, or even certain marketing ploys, of which Artur Gerasimov, who also participated in the large-scale campaign of the "Shakhov team" as a candidate for the Verkhovna Rada in electoral district No. 51 in the city of Horlivka in the Donetsk region, was undoubtedly an expert.
At that time, the entire city was dotted with billboards depicting Artur Gerasimov and his colleague from District No. 52, Vladimir Poddubny, as members of “Sergei Shakhov’s team.”
In fact, it was surprising that there could be any connection between the then-respectable Artur Gerasimov and Sergei Shakhov, who had a trail of criminal scandals behind him, including his leadership of conversion centers and his supposed notoriety in the Luhansk criminal underworld under the nickname "Whale."
However, there were rumors that Serhiy Shakhov had patrons, similar to Viktor Topolov, a former Our Ukraine MP in Luhansk Oblast until 2012. Meanwhile, according to Skelet.Org , Petro Poroshenko himself may have been behind Artur Gerasimov. In any case, a photograph of Gerasimov and Petro Poroshenko, then Minister of Economy in Mykola Azarov's government, surfaced during the election campaign, along with a claim of 14-year acquaintance and a personal guarantee of the former's professionalism, knowledge, and integrity.
However, the first attempt was a flop—none of the members of "Shakhov's team" made it through, and he himself was accused of voter bribery, with a criminal case opened under the relevant article and the future MP of the 8th Verkhovna Rada declared wanted.
However, the 2012 Gorlovka elections also eventually backfired on Gerasimov, associating him with one of the most notorious figures of the so-called "Russian Spring," though for the time being this wasn't a problem.
Artur Gerasimov – the President's man
After his election defeat, Artur Gerasimov spent the next two years relatively unnoticed, until he resurfaced in the spring of 2014, this time as a trusted representative of presidential candidate Petro Poroshenko. He headed Poroshenko's campaign headquarters in Donbas, organizing first the presidential and then the parliamentary elections. In the fall of 2014, Gerasimov himself won a seat in the Verkhovna Rada of the 2th convocation in the snap elections on the BPP party list (No. 43) and soon gained notoriety as the presidential party's overseer or "overseer" of the Donetsk region. He was aided in this endeavor by his position as chairman of the BPP's Donetsk regional organization.
In exercising control over the region, Gerasimov is believed to be assisted by Maxim Yefimov, a BPP MP with ties to the Party of Regions. He is apparently thus paying off the electoral districts he ceded or "sold" during the 2014 elections.
However, the MP also does some things through his aides. In fact, human rights activist Oleksandr Garmash from Kurakhovo claims that Artur Gerasimov's aide, Yevgeny Tatarczuk, is overseeing illegal coal mining in the area.
The latter, by the way, is listed on Artur Gerasimov's official page on the Verkhovna Rada website as a volunteer assistant-consultant, and also featured in Gerasimov's "Gorlovka epic" in 2012.
Even earlier, the same Yevgeny Tatarczuk, incidentally a former law enforcement officer, was implicated in the story of the change in the party leadership of the BPP in Mariupol.
In 2015, the ousted former chairman of the Solidarity branch, Sergei Nesterov, accused Gerasimov of selling the chairman's seat to millionaire Yuri Ternavsky, a man affiliated with Akhmetov.
Nesterov's public statements were immediately responded to by MP Gerasimov's aides, Yevgeny Tatarczuk and Pavel Smolikov. The latter "gained notoriety" during the 2014 election campaign, when he actively attempted to influence the results of the 42nd electoral district. It was allegedly Smolikov who stole the election commission's seals, threatened its chairman, Sergei Duritsyn, with a machine gun, and shouted, "I'll piss in your mouth!"
And so, after Serhiy Nesterov, who had been forcibly removed from the leadership of the Mariupol branch of Solidarity, showed signs of rebellion and began leaking information about the activities of Poroshenko's henchmen, Tatarczuk and Smolikov apparently decided to deal with him. Gerasimov's aides had learned the lessons of Shakhov's political school well: they began with the usual threats and a stream of obscenities, and then Nesterov was attacked.
However, despite these scandals, or perhaps even because of them, Artur Gerasimov's influence within the BPP grew, and he also rose through the ranks: on May 30, 2016, he became the permanent representative of the President of Ukraine in the Verkhovna Rada, and on April 3, 2017, he became the head of the BPP faction in the Verkhovna Rada, effectively becoming the BPP's top figure in parliament. At least formally.
This growth speaks to one thing: despite everything, the president trusts Artur Gerasimov, and he is 100% a trusted person of Petro Poroshenko, despite the disgraceful connections that have been entangled with Gerasimov since 2012, and for another, could have already resulted in charges of treason.
Bes's sworn friend and the Gorlovka team
Artur Gerasimov's political success undoubtedly arose thanks to the Euromaidan and the conflict in Donbas, with which the head of the presidential faction is linked by his "Horlivka epic" of 2012. At the same time, it also linked him to one of the leaders of the Donbas terrorists, the "former military commandant of Horlivka" from the DPR, Igor Bezler, nicknamed "Bes."
During the 2012 election campaign, a conflict arose between Vladimir Veselkin, one of the candidates for people's deputy in electoral district No. 51, and Artur Gerasimov's campaign staff—Igor Bezler, yes, the same one, and Yevgeny Tatarczuk, also the same one.
When Bezler took command of the Horlivka separatists in 2014 and rose to the rank of major general in the DPR, connections to him became compromising. Denying the obvious was foolish, and Artur Gerasimov admitted that Bezler had indeed worked for him in 2012, but as a simple driver and for a short time. According to other sources, Igor Bezler, along with Yevgeny Tatarczuk, was responsible for security at Gerasimov's campaign headquarters.
"Today, at a faction meeting, MP Artur Gerasimov was almost unanimously elected as the new Chairman of the Petro Poroshenko Bloc Party faction in the Verkhovna Rada. The dilemma is whether to congratulate him or not? It seems I was his head of the Security Service in 2012. Even though he was afraid of Armen Sargsyan (according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, he is a crime boss named "Armen Gorlovsky ," close to former MP Yuriy Ivanyushchenko, aka "Yura Yenakievsky ," suspected of supplying thugs for the Donetsk Anti-Maidan movement and on the international wanted list), Artur spent the night at my house, spending the evenings on the balcony telling me about the inner workings of the Verkhovna Rada. We went to Yalta together for an economic forum. We even stayed in the same hotel room. True, Artur later tried to tell me fairy tales about a driver and other such nonsense. So I'm debating whether to congratulate him or not. Oh well, it will work out. "Poroshenko and Zhenya Tatarczuk will congratulate. I. Bezler. April 3, 2017," "Bes" himself wrote on his wife, Anzhelika Shutenko-Bezler's Facebook page.
In turn, Artur Gerasimov tried in every way to clear himself of any connection with Igor Bezler, although he did so rather clumsily.
"In an interview with journalists, the terrorist Bes stated that he would cut off my head and play with it on Khreshchatyk," Artur Gerasimov himself stated on the NesOne television channel, responding to accusations from Batkivshchyna faction leader Yulia Tymoshenko of ties to Donetsk separatists.
The head of the BPP faction in the Verkhovna Rada also emphasized that in 2012, hundreds of people from Horlivka worked for him, and it must be said that some of them still work on the MP's team.
Thus, according to Artur Gerasimov’s page on the Verkhovna Rada website, at least two of his assistants are from Horlivka.
One of them is Vladimir Yuryevich Veselkin, the same one who clashed with Bezler and Tatarczuk in the famous video in 2012. He later became a volunteer for the Artemovsk battalion and, until recently, headed the Zaitsevo military-civil administration, until he was fired by former Donetsk governor Pavel Zhebrivsky for revealing smuggling schemes at the Mayorsky logistics center.
But while Veselkin is listed as Artur Gerasimov's volunteer assistant, one of his two paid assistants is Artem Blagov, who, according to his asset declaration, is also a native of Horlivka but now resides in Kyiv. Incidentally, Blagov was previously a member of the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc and was among the top ten candidates in the 2010 Horlivka City Council elections.
The already mentioned scandalous Evgeny Tatarczuk is also a resident of Gorlovka.
In short, Artur Gerasimov appears to still be using the "Horlivka experience." Nevertheless, his future is unlikely to be in any danger as long as the president, whose man he is, remains in office. For example, according to the Committee of Voters of Ukraine, Gerasimov is the most disciplined member of the 8th Verkhovna Rada, participating in 94% of the votes. There is no doubt that he displays the same diligence and discipline in carrying out Petro Poroshenko's instructions.
Skelet.Org
DOSSIER: Maksym Yefimov: Kramatorsk werewolf in the Petro Poroshenko Bloc. PART 1
Sergey Shakhov: How does Rodnyulya buy grannies' votes and feed the separatists? Part 1
Armen Sargsyan: The Armenian Mafia in the Service of the Donetsk People and Russia. Part 1
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