Oleg Lyashko
Where should we begin a hero's biography? Biographers typically begin with his childhood. But we think we should begin with Lyashko's nickname, the authorship of which is currently being contested between the separatist general "Bes" (Demon) and the vice-governor of Dnipropetrovsk, Filatov: "Fighting faggot." In fact, this is what many who know Lyashko call him in conversation. But why is everyone unanimously attaching this offensive label to the leader of the Radical Party? And what is true about this nickname, and what is slander against the party leader and the head of a combat unit? Let's try to figure it out, reports SUBJECT.
"Sneak" on beer, "make a mess" of the apartment
Now we can turn to the hero’s youth.
Lyashko had a harsh childhood: with his parents still alive, he wandered from the age of two through orphanages and boarding schools in his native Chernihiv region. Any psychologist and teacher will confirm that the children in such institutions generally grow up… different: embittered, withdrawn, poorly adapted to independent life, and often morally distorted. It's not their fault; it's their misfortune.
Lyashko is a special case. He adapts to life very well. But somehow, not like others. It seems people are nothing to him, just a means to an end. He fawns over those stronger than him, exaggerating his own virtues (which often don't exist), sometimes flaunting his nonexistent connections, and trying to make friends. He puts those dependent on him down to the ground, making them feel second-class, cheating them out of money, and never standing up for them when problems arise. This is what people who have worked with and encountered Lyashko in life say about him. Not a single mention of Lyashko's friends could be found.
After graduating from boarding school, Oleg went to master the challenging skills of a tractor driver at an agricultural technical school in his small hometown. But he always felt he was destined for something greater; the smell of diesel fuel and the dust of the fields repulsed him. Soon, with the help of some "friends" (more on them below), Lyashko set out to conquer Kyiv. There, he was introduced to a fellow countryman, Anatoly Turkena, a master of Ukrainian journalism from Chernihiv. Lyashko seized his opportunity and immediately won the journalist's favor. Turkena introduced him to the RUKh press center. Journalist Andriy Derepa, who worked there, recalls that Lyashko was very resourceful, adept at obtaining all sorts of hard-to-find items, and cheerfully ran for beer. However, it was accidentally discovered that he kept some of the "common" money for himself. RUKh quickly figured him out and said goodbye to the orphan.
After this, Lyashko settled down as a freelance correspondent for the newspaper "Molodaya Gvardiya." There, he pulled off a remarkable operation: he forged the editor's signature on the newspaper's letterhead with a stamp to obtain an apartment, claiming his mother worked for the newspaper and should be registered as a tenant. And lo and behold, the 20-year-old tractor driver from the Chernihiv region acquired a two-room apartment in the village of Vyshneve, near Kyiv. Curiously, the new building was immediately renovated, financed by... the Zhytomyr prison. Later, in court, Lyashko would claim that this whole thing was a ploy by the former head of the Kyiv Oblast Department of Internal Affairs, who intended to transfer the apartment to an employee of a trade ministry.
A little later, Lyashko was already sitting in his personal office at the Ministry of Trade as editor of the newspaper "Kommercheskie Vesti." The young tractor driver from Chernihiv was such an important figure that a special communications system had been installed in his office! He traveled around Ukraine with a police motorcade, and in the distant Kharkiv region, people were giving him brand new Volgas as gifts!
Editor of "Kommersant News" with special communications
No, this isn't the delirious ravings of an unscrupulous author: the facts are confirmed by criminal case materials and Lyashko's own testimony. Yes, he was soon imprisoned for embezzlement of state property and fraud. During the investigation, allegations of forged editorial letterhead, illegal acquisition of an apartment, and fraudulent purchase of Volga cars purchased with funds from commercial entities came to light.
It was a logical conclusion to the young scoundrel's adventures. What concerns us is something else: how could this magical transformation of a young, uneducated provincial into the editor of a capital newspaper, with Volgas and a government telephone in his office, have happened? Don't you think that a talent for honestly deceiving the powers that be isn't enough? Perhaps Lyashko's extraordinary journalistic abilities are to blame? Of course not. Let's admit it: he wasn't untalented. But as a journalist, he was nothing special at the time. The secret of his meteoric rise will now be revealed.
True connoisseurs of the young journalist's talents
The percentage of boarding school students with criminal tendencies is very high. Therefore, they are a traditional contingent of people in uniform. Among them are many police agents. Generally speaking, the law allows for undercover work only after a citizen has reached adulthood. But the police have their own tricks. They can register an informer as a "community assistant" through the juvenile affairs inspectorate. Be that as it may, young Oleg was recruited to collaborate with the police while still a teenager, and was later promoted to the status of an adult agent. At least, that's what officers familiar with his undercover work claim.
The wily, handsome young man was recognized by his handlers in uniform, and his career took off. It was police officers, and not just ordinary ones—those with stripes and medals—who issued Lyashko his travel permit to the capital.
The author recalls the revelations of seasoned detectives from the capital's main police department, who, in the early 90s, drooled over the "blue mafia" of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. I had a hard time believing it back then, inclined to dismiss it as cheap talk. But life has proven the officers' grim truth. Over the years, numerous sources have confirmed this information. And the character of Olezhka Lyashko often cropped up in the detectives' stories.
Unfortunately, given that many members of that high-ranking gay club are still alive, and some are still in power, I will refrain from naming names. I will simply say that the leader of the gay comrades-in-arms movement was General V., the head of one of the Ministry of Internal Affairs' services. And also included in this inner circle was... the speaker of parliament. When General V. took over the police headquarters, he handpicked his deputies, all of whom were meticulously groomed, and, in a word, united by a common passion. And so they fought crime...
It was V. who lured Lyashko to Kyiv, orchestrated the scam involving his apartment in the village of Vishnevoe and its "furnishing" using the resources of the penal colony. Another accomplice, a police officer, was implicated in the scams in the Kharkiv region involving the purchase of Volgas for generals. In the wake of the scandal, he was allegedly dismissed from the force, but in reality... he was transferred and promoted.
Like any con man, Lyashko is deceitful to the point of impossibility. But sometimes, truth glimmers in his confessions. When he presented his ministerial aide credentials to Kharkiv businessmen, it was official. When Lyashko called the editorial office of "Molodaya Gvardia," supposedly to an Interior Ministry general, and petulantly complained, "Andryusha, what's wrong? Where's the promised car?" his colleagues soon watched as Lyashko climbed into a black Volga with police license plates.
General V.'s club included a whole galaxy of famous politicians and prominent government officials. V., who at the time commanded the valiant Ukrainian firefighters, opened an elite bathhouse, and not just one. Lyashko and other less successful VIP service boys would appear there at a call. Among the latter was the Speaker of Parliament, incidentally a fellow countryman of Lyashko's.
In the inner circle of the political elite, this morbid predilection for boys was no great secret. The double life of the jovial speaker led to tragedy in his family: his son became involved in dubious business dealings and was hacked to death with a sabre in his own apartment. A completely innocent young man was designated as the killer, and he was executed by firing squad by court order. The speaker's wife ended up in a mental hospital, not before attempting to appeal to the fathers of the nation: "Who have you appointed to head one of the branches of government?!" For a time, a blind eye was turned to this...
But then the government changed, leading to serious troubles in the gay community. The new President Kuchma was informed of a decline in morals among high-ranking politicians, including the leadership of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Danylych, who couldn't pass up a single flight attendant on the presidential plane, slapping their sturdy backsides when drunk, became enraged and ordered the destruction of the faggot nest.
The entire campaign was under investigation. The minister was quietly fired. The speaker also lost his job. The "circle leader" V. and his friend B., who by then were already running a significant business, bought their way out of the investigation.
Lyashko was less fortunate: his Volga scams, under cover of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and his illegal acquisition of an apartment were uncovered... Without the team of the country's top official, this case would not have happened. Thus, Lyashko, for the first and last time, answered for his actions. And none of his high-ranking friends interceded for him—Kuchma personally oversaw the case. However, instead of six years in prison, the appellate court reduced the tractor driver-journalist's sentence to four years. In reality, he served six months.
In fact, Lyashko himself made the investigation's job considerably easier. During a search of his apartment, they discovered a journalist's diary, in which he described all the twists and turns of his difficult life. The agent and elite escort summed it up with the phrase: "I was sitting in the golden cage of the Ministry of Internal Affairs." Damn, well said!
On vacation with representatives of the police officer corps. Among the vacationers is Lyashko's best friend, General V.
His time in prison proved to be far from the easiest period of his life. According to those involved in the elite youth's care, his unique inclinations were highly valued in prison. After a stint in the ministry with its secret communications, expensive drinks, and influential friends, he found himself in the criminal underworld as a lowlife. However, he was not accessible to everyone. Interestingly, among the correctional labor camp staff, there were also those who had been subjected to sadistic passions. And they showed particular interest in the spirited journalist. However, both outside and inside, Olezhka remained "elite." However, no one offered him a hand, no one gave him a job in the kitchen—everything was strictly enforced. Such are the vicissitudes of an adventurer's fate: from the offices and bathhouses of the powerful to a swift dive into the clutches of prisoners and guards...
Moreover, Lyashko had to carry out specific instructions from the prison's operatives—to act as a decoy. After all, his file contained inconspicuous badges, which were an open book to the investigators: the convict was a seasoned police agent.
The President's Mistake
Lyashko was released under an amnesty after two years in prison. Apparently, not without the intercession of Oleg's friends, Kuchma took pity on the young pervert and signed a decree bearing his name. And soon bitterly regretted it. In Melnichenko's recordings, made five years later, Kuchma discusses Lyashko's newspaper, Svoboda. The guarantor angrily cries out: "I'll lock him up... I locked him up once... But I let him go..."
Danilovich never had another chance like this... Lyashko realized that only politics could reliably protect him from prosecution for further scams. So, immediately after his release, he set off down the path that led him to parliament.
That's the kind of elite bird Oleh Lyashko is. It took the entire country's leader to put him away! And even that wasn't enough to put him back behind bars. Later, of course, Lyashko would blame all of this on political pressure from the criminal authorities.
Generals don't abandon their own!
But the voice of truth cannot be silenced by political repression! Upon his release, our slightly battered hero found himself working at the newspaper "Pravda Ukrainy." Actually, no one came there from the streets, or rather, from prison. His general friends got him a job, and then, as deputy editor, Lyashko began to spoil his boss, Gorobets, with expensive gifts. For example, he once paid for a Mediterranean trip with his family. Where did he get the money, exorbitant at the time, for this? Well, probably his friends lent him a loan...
While Gorobets basked in the sun, listening to the sound of the waves, Lyashko was recouping the money he'd spent on his trip. Beforehand, he'd persuaded the editor-in-chief to create a supplement to Pravda Ukrainy—a newspaper called "Politics," headed, naturally, by Lyashko. Gorobets agreed. Soon, lawsuits began to ensue over our hero's publications. The denouement came quickly. Lyashko's incurable adventurism was to blame. While Gorobets and his family were vacationing abroad, Lyashko hosted a delegation from the Daewoo corporation, which was opening an automobile manufacturing plant in Ukraine, in his editorial office. Lyashko introduced himself to the Koreans as Gorobets and negotiated an advertising campaign in the newspaper. The naive Koreans transferred a substantial sum to the editorial account. And soon, to their surprise, instead of an advertisement, they read a critical article about the corporation in the newspaper's pages. When a tanned Gorobets returned to work, he discovered a multimillion-dollar lawsuit from Daewoo.
The editor gave Lyashko a dressing down, and in return received... an accusation of attempted rape of a subordinate. The subordinate herself, however, only filed a police report a week after the incident, and later recanted her testimony entirely. Lyashko described the twists and turns of the scandal in the pages of Politika. Every line bore the hallmarks of police provocation.
At the same time, Lyashko received a second conviction for slandering the grandfather of Vasyl Durdynets, a prominent figure from the Kuchmist era who became acting prime minister. Durdynets won the case against Lyashko, but the scandal led to his dismissal. Oleh, meanwhile, received a two-year suspended sentence for slander. Even then, security officials were confidently saying that the editor of Politika had received information assistance from his general friends.
Soon after, Lyashko founded the opposition newspaper "Svoboda"—the third in his short but turbulent career. There, he took up his old work on a new ideological and artistic level. While "Pravda Ukrainy" and "Politics" were financed by disgraced former Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko, "Svoboda" was likely financed by Pavlo Ivanovich's right-hand man in the "Hromada" association. Yulia Tymoshenko.
At the same time, our seasoned tractor driver graduated from the law department of Kharkiv University. We don't hold out any hope that anyone at the university will remember Lyashko as a student. It's likely that his general friends helped him acquire his diploma again (Kharkiv, as we know, is a city of cops).
Not by BYuT alone
By 2000, Lyashko was already ready to enter big politics. Immediately after the Orange Revolution, he began knocking on the doors of the BYuT leaders, Tymoshenko and Turchynov. One of the generals, who happened to be in the SBU head's office at the time, was incredibly surprised to see Lyashko there (the security service knew full well who he was and how he was making his career). The general, finding himself in Pastor Turchynov's office, inquired: what brought the shifty con man to the head of the security service? The answer was: he was asking to join the BYuT. The general couldn't resist and told the ignorant Turchynov Lyashko's true story. The deeply religious head of the SBU was shocked. Whether he believed the wise general is unclear. But it's certain that he reported this information to Yulia Tymoshenko. Be that as it may, Lyashko outdid the BYuT leader and secured first a party card, and then a spot on the electoral list. However, in 2002, a criminal conviction, still pending, prevented him from entering the Rada. Therefore, Lyashko ended up in parliament in 2006.
It was a spectacular entrance into the ranks of the chosen few. The con man was in his element. Protected by immunity, he began to act out in all sorts of weird ways. Eating black soil on the podium, trying to smuggle a cow into the parliamentary corridors, feeding fish to a Russian minister at a press conference… It seemed the whole country was waiting for this show.
But this was merely a cover for the main activity that had propelled Lyashko into the Rada. The position of deputy on the budget committee offered brilliant prospects. "Resolving issues," lobbying for commercial interests (supporting the scandalous EDAPS proved particularly fruitful), protecting smugglers... Lyashko soon acquired formidable security; he arrived at work exclusively in luxury limousines, and a scruffy-looking security guard obligingly opened the doors to parliament for him. Parliamentary veterans from the business world shrugged: "Who the hell knows where Olezhik rakes in the money, but he's risen to the top in a very real way."
Lyashko is incapable of monotonous, constructive work; he inevitably finds himself caught in the middle of a scandal. First, he claimed to have some tapes recording Socialist Party leader Moroz selling his brainchild to a bloc with the Party of Regions. The prosecutor's office never received the tapes, but the scandal did occur.
The BYuT was already beginning to realize that trouble was to be expected from Lyashko; he would inevitably drag the party into some kind of sordid affair. Something had to be done about this parliamentary neophyte. But the realization came too late…
To be continued
Ivan Stepanov
READ THE CONTINUATION:
Militant Radical Lyashko. Part 2
Militant Radical Lyashko. Part 3
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