Sergey Levochkin and Yulia Levochkina
In connection with the recent land scandal, the name of not only the former eminence grise of Ukrainian politics, but also the so-called "Levochkin family" has resurfaced. This family is small, not like, say, Kruk clanThis family includes Sergei Vladimirovich himself and his sister, Yulia Vladimirovna Levochkina.
But that doesn't include their business partners and the host of hangers-on from a strange organization called the "New Ukraine Institute," which brings together some rather odious figures from the "Family" era. With them, the "family" is quite extensive. But let's return to the Lyovochkins. They are both members of parliament from the Opposition Bloc and very influential people. However, judging by recent scandals, their influence is waning. Until recently, the Lyovochkins were the untouchable "sacred cows" of Ukrainian politics. To understand the nature of this influence, we need to take a brief historical detour.
Levochkin. "The Gray Cardinal" and his sister
Their father, Vladimir Anatolyevich Levochkin, was a general in the internal troops, worked in the penitentiary service, and even headed it for a time. Rumors circulated that he knew a great deal about Viktor Yanukovych. What exactly he knew was never made public; he took this secret to his grave. Although he may have shared it with his children. According to some sources, this was the main reason for Sergey Vladimirovich's unsinkability throughout Yanukovych's political career, not only from his appointment as prime minister to his election as president. Much earlier, in the late 90s, Levochkin Jr. was an advisor to Viktor Yanukovych during the latter's tenure as governor of the Donetsk region. From there, in Donetsk, he ran for parliament for the first time, but failed.
And it was in Donetsk that Sergei Vladimirovich's first business projects began. These included the company "Vizavi," which was involved in the creation of the "Industrial Union of Donbass," East-West-Finance, Stroyinvest, and Misto Bank. But the most interesting of his related assets was the Askold Bank, later renamed "Bankersky Dom." It was also known among the bankers as "Banditsky Dom." This bank was one of the largest currency conversion centers at the time. But it also wasn't above outright scams, defrauding both the state and private individuals. Money from several National Bank branches passed through its accounts, and later, it was lost in the accounts of companies and firms affiliated with "Bankersky Dom." In 1999, a fire broke out at the bank, destroying all its documents. Many depositors, including several high-ranking ambassadors, lost their money. The bank was placed under temporary administration and renamed Ukrspetsimpexbank. Back in 1992, Sergei Levochkin drove a Mercedes 600; later, after a couple of years at the bank, he switched to a Volvo.
In principle, this is the ultimate dream of a “simple Donetsk guy,” but Sergei Vladimirovich is an ambitious man and he was one of the first “Donetsk guys” to move to Kyiv.
It's not known for certain what exactly prompted his move to the capital. Perhaps it was ambition, indeed. Perhaps it was defrauded investors, among whom, as we've already mentioned, were far from the most important people in the country. Or perhaps it was all of these things combined. But the names of two people are known for certain who recommended the enterprising young businessman to then-President Leonid Kuchma: Viktor Yanukovych, the then-governor of Donbas, and Heorhiy Chernyavsky, head of the presidential protocol service. Lyovochkin was hired by Volodymyr Lytvyn, the then-head of the patronage service. They say that early in his career in the Presidential Administration, Serhiy Lytvyn was constantly hiding from those he had recently "cheated." Former employees of the building on Bankova Street recall that the future "gray cardinal" would literally hide under the table or at Lytvyn's dacha. As for the young official's duties, they were also interesting. They say he maintained the apartment where his boss, Lytvyn, met with his mistress.
Vladimir Litvin and Sergey Levochkin
(Read more about it in the article Volodymyr Lytvyn: Does Ukraine need a professional Judas?)
Then Levochkin's career took off. He became an assistant in the Presidential Administration, then a scientific adviser to the president, and then an aide to the president. This seemingly secretary-level position actually opened up vast horizons. After all, it is the presidential aide who shapes the head of state's workday and decides who should be scheduled for appointments and who should be turned down. Furthermore, information that reaches the president's desk also passes through him. And so, his first success. He managed to slightly push aside the then-all-powerful "gray cardinal" Alexander Volkov. Some of the money flowed through the young official. For example, he lobbied for the interests of the EDAPS company, which became a monopoly in the production of government documents, from passports to notary forms. Volkov's other mistake was that "Mikhalych" did everything himself. Sergei Levochkin, however, immediately began building a team. He introduced his old friends and partners: Artem Yershov into Oschadbank, Rostislav Schiller into the SDPU(o) and arms trade, Sergei Svyatko into the state mortgage institution, Misto-Bank, and later into RosUkrEnergo Ivan Fursin, and he placed his son-in-law Arseniy Novikov at Ukrspetsexport, and then at Naftogaz. It was perhaps during this time that his talent as a communicator first became apparent. He communicated, for example, with Kurochkin and Yanukovych, and Pinchuk (Read more about it in the article Viktor Pinchuk: Ukraine's richest son-in-law) and Grigorishina And, apparently, he makes a tidy profit from it. But in the early 2000s, his sister, Yulia Levochkina (Novikova by marriage), finally came into the picture.
Leonid Kuchma and Sergei Levochkin
Yulia Vladimirovna had apparently not previously appeared in her brother's schemes due to her relatively young age. But in 2003, she was already working at Misto Bank, controlled by Sergei Vladimirovich, in a lowly position as a department deputy. Three years later, she made a career leap and immediately became chair of the supervisory board of Mykolaiv Bread Products Plant, which was effectively owned by her brother and Ivan Fursin. And in 2007, she was introduced to big politics. Yulia Novikova (Levochkina) became a people's deputy from the Party of Regions, occupying the 105th position on that political party's list. It is said that the person who compiled the lists Boris Kolesnikov He didn't even know whose sister she was. Yulia Vladimirovna's career in the Verkhovna Rada was quite successful, and she joined the permanent delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). The Levochkins had reached the international level. But then a scandal erupted with the Russian delegation, which will be discussed later.
Yulia Levochkina
Meanwhile, her brother's fortunes were up and down. He became the president's "grey cardinal." Victor MedvedchukLeonid Danilovich was generally a proponent of a system of checks and balances. So, having appointed Medvedchuk as head of the Presidential Administration, he created the position of First Assistant to the President for Lyovochkin. Serhiy Volodymyrovych, bypassing the all-powerful "Prince of Darkness and the Dark Ones," established Kuchma's communications with Lytvyn and Yanukovych. In 2004, according to some sources, he was involved in the notorious "transit server" that rigged the elections in Yanukovych's favor; according to others, he became a mediator in negotiations between Kuchma and Yushenko during the Orange Revolution. In other words, "both ours and yours," which is, in principle, his style. After Kuchma's departure, Lyovochkin naturally left the building on Bankova Street. But he did not leave politics. He became an advisor to Verkhovna Rada Speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn, and in the 2006 elections, he attempted to enter parliament on Lytvyn's party list, but along with the entire Lytvyn Bloc, he failed to pass the threshold. However, that same year, Yanukovych became prime minister, and Serhiy Lyovochkin became his chief of staff. In 2007, he joined the political council of the Party of Regions and finally became a member of parliament. He was on the same list as his sister, but his number was 42.
So, since 2007, the Levochkin siblings have been working side by side in the Verkhovna Rada. Business was also going quite well at the time. Even before his election, Sergei Vladimirovich lobbied for the monopoly "gas schemes" of RosUkrEnergo, and promoted his aforementioned partner, Ivan Fursin, to a shareholder position. This brought Levochkin closer to the majority shareholder of this gas monopoly. Dmitry Firtash and opened up vast opportunities. His talents and connections were augmented by enormous wealth. His newfound partners promoted their own people into power—Konstantin Grishchenko as Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the aforementioned Artem Yershov as Deputy Minister of Finance. In 2009, Levochkin had a conflict with another deputy, Nestor ShufrichYanukovych, then the leader of the Party of Regions, expressed disapproval of Nestor Ivanovich's absence from his entourage during his trip to Kerch. Shufrych responded by accusing Levochkin of setting him up, claiming he hadn't warned him about his boss's trip. As they were leaving the courtroom, Nestor Ivanovich slapped Sergey Vladimirovich hard in the face, causing him to slide down the wall. Deputies rushed over and pulled him away. Levochkin only got his chance to take revenge on the scandalous deputy several years later.
In 2010, Serhiy Lyovochkin headed Yanukovych's campaign headquarters, and after his victory, he became the true, official "gray cardinal," head of the Presidential Administration. Shufrych, who was awarded the post of head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations for his active work during the elections and long, loyal service, was the first to sense that Serhiy Volodymyrovych was not forgetting anything. At first, he was not included in the National Security and Defense Council, although his position required it. And three months after his appointment, he was completely dismissed. Then came the purge of Yanukovych's entire "old team," which had served the Pope faithfully and loyally when he was in the opposition. Anna German was reshuffled—the president was given a different press secretary, a native of Western Ukraine who closely resembled her—Darka Chepak. He also sidelined Taras Chornovil, who had gone through hard times with his boss. According to some reports, it was he who persuaded Viktor Fedorovich to imprison him. TymoshenkoAt the same time, he and his partners, primarily from RosUkrEnergo, which was reorganized into GDF (Dmytro Firtash Group), were expanding his business empire. During Viktor Fedorovich's tenure, this structure acquired assets such as Nadra Bank, Severodonetsk Azot, the Zaporizhzhia Titanium and Magnesium Plant, and others. The Parus business center was built. A "pocket opposition" was created in the form of Vitali Klitschko's UDAR party. But his main asset became Inter Media Group, and its crown jewel, the Inter television channel. Sergei Levochkin officially announced his stake in the "first television button." But in 2011-2012, the Levochkin brothers began to experience problems. Both of them, in fact.
Serhiy Levochkin and Viktor Yanukovych are almost on air.
Yulia Lyovochkina, as we wrote earlier, became embroiled in a European scandal with the Russian delegation. The Russians wanted to include Ukraine in the list of countries with problems with neo-Nazism. This was related to the events in Lviv on May 9 of that year. Yulia Vladimirovna prevented this through scandal. The Russian lobby in the Party of Regions has always been very strong, and Lyovochkina was removed from the Party of Regions list in 2012. In fact, that year, the Donetsk group was actually pushed out of the Lyovochkin-Firtashevsky list. However, he found a way out of this situation. At that time, the head of Crimea, which was then still part of Ukraine, was Anatoly Mogilev. Before this, he became infamous for a series of scandals while serving as Minister of Internal Affairs. In Crimea, he was also dogged by scandals involving the expropriation of property and land, outright criminal activity, and the murders of mayors of several resort towns. There is a theory that he ordered the murders—the hitman, a certain Sinezhuk, who carried out the killings. The Crimean Deputy Prime Minister acted as an intermediary. Pavel Burlakov.
Mogilev was apparently already set to be removed. But Sergei Vladimirovich helped the official who had fallen out of favor, putting in a good word for him with the Pope. And as a return favor, Mogilev installed Yulia Levochkina in Feodosia's No. 6 constituency. In Crimea, they claim that Yulia Vladimirovna's likely rival, Tatar businessman Ayder Isayev, was killed for this purpose. And again, by the same Sinezhuk, who was connected to Burlakov and Mogilev.
Be that as it may, Sergei Levochkin's sister, who has no connection to Crimea, ran in 2012 from a Crimean polling station. While elected, she became embroiled in a couple of scandals. One was financial: she declared seven plots of land, a fleet of cars, and several million rubles in her bank accounts. This looks quite alarming, considering that Yulia Vladimirovna had been a modest "servant of the people" since 2007. The second involved an affair with Vitaly Chudnovsky, a member of the BYuT party and an MP from the opposing camp. Her correspondence with Lady Yu's bodyguard was photographed by observant journalists and leaked online.
Meanwhile, Sergei Vladimirovich's influence began to noticeably decline. The fact is that the "Family"—young Donetsk officials and businessmen close to the president's son, Oleksandr Yanukovych—began to cling to power. In 2013-2014, they seized virtually all key positions in the country. There was talk of replacing Levochkin with then-Interior Minister Vitaly Yuryevich Zakharchenko. The head of the Presidential Administration resisted as best he could. It was his Inter television channel that then hyped the scandal involving the rape and beating of Iryna Krashkova in Vradiyivka by police—Zakharchenko's subordinates. And miraculously, deputies from UDAR, sponsored by the "gray cardinal," showed up at the impromptu rally. Sergei Vladimirovich retained his position, but this didn't solve all his problems. Conflicts with the "Family" and the brothers who had joined them continued. KlyuevykhIt didn't help that Viktor Fedorovich's mistress, Lyubov Polezhai, was registered as Yulia Levochkina's assistant. And then the Euromaidan erupted. There is no direct evidence of Sergei Levochkin's involvement in organizing the "Revolution of Dignity." But there are some interesting facts.
One of the Maidan's leaders was Vitali Klitschko, the leader of the UDAR party, which collaborates with Lyovochkin. Furthermore, one of the first to take to the Maidan was Mustafa Nayem, a journalist suspected of long-standing ties to Sergey Vladimirovich. Indeed, he was one of the first to benefit from this. Be that as it may, it was the Lyovochkins who grasped the situation faster than other representatives of the "criminal government."
Sergei Levochkin himself resigned from his post as head of the Presidential Administration during the Maidan, and his sister, even earlier, immediately after the dispersal of students, left the Party of Regions faction, and then the party.
The Lyovochkin family found common ground with the new government relatively easily. Vitali Klitschko ceded his place in the presidential election to Petro Poroshenko. Negotiations regarding this took place with the personal involvement of Sergei Vladimirovich, as he himself admitted. They were not subject to EU sanctions, which were compiled based on the lists submitted by Ukraine. In 2014, the brother and sister again entered parliament on the Opposition Bloc list. Their reputation was somewhat tarnished by Yulia Volodymyrivna's speech at PACE on January 28, 2015, when she called on MEPs to oppose the Ukrainian government "which is trying to erect a wall between Ukraine and Russia." However, despite Yatsenyuk's party demanding that the Prosecutor General's Office evaluate this speech, everything went without consequences. Moreover, he "brought" between 50 and 60 "his" deputies into the Rada, according to various estimates. Not only through the Opposition Bloc, but also through the Bloc. Petro Poroshenko, the Radical Party, and single-member constituencies. He still has influence over the mayor of Kyiv; moreover, he is a close friend of his. Igor Nikonov He took the post of First Deputy Prime Minister of the Kyiv City Administration. Some political analysts cautiously predicted that Sergei Vladimirovich would become Prime Minister.
But then, apparently, something went wrong. In June 2015, Serhiy Lyovochkin gave an interview to the German publication Die Zeit, in which he harshly criticized Petro Poroshenko, specifically claiming that the president was dividing Ukraine. He didn't have to wait long for a response. Publications immediately appeared accusing the Lyovochkin family of a land scandal. Their land plots were found in Kozyn and Koncha-Zaspa, in the village of Trilesy in the Fastiv district, and near the village of Gnidyn. The latter property is particularly dubious: near the same village is a resort owned by Serhiy Volodymyrovych's business partner, Oleh Titarenko. It was also there that activist Yuriy Verbytskyi was found murdered during the Euromaidan in 2014. Hromadske TV sees a connection between these facts, and its journalist, Dmytro Gnap, dared to openly insult the once-all-powerful "gray cardinal." In response to Levochkin's lawyers' appeal, he made them a rather obscene counter-offer on his social media page.
And here is the video itself:
Besides Poroshenko, Serhiy Lyovochkin has plenty of enemies in Ukraine. For example, Igor Kolomoisky. The root of their feud is unclear. Some experts point to a conflict with the late Igor Yeremeyev: allegedly, Lyovochkin sided with him. Others say that Igor Valerievich is aiming to re-privatize some assets belonging to Firtash and Lyovochkin. But the conflict has become public, with Inter and 1+1, both controlled by the feuding oligarchs, unleashing a series of films and reports exposing the opposing sides. It's hard to say who won; it's more likely a draw.
Sergei Vladimirovich also has a complicated relationship with the current prime minister. The latter has been attacking chemical plants owned by Firtash, demanding repayment for gas, and threatening to nationalize them otherwise. Furthermore, the Cabinet of Ministers has waged a war over the Sumykhimprom plant, which has been driven to bankruptcy. There's also a war over the Odessa Port Plant, which we've already written about. In short, the Levochkin family's fortunes have been going from bad to worse lately.
Sergey Levochkin
According to the latest reports, Sergei Levochkin has left Ukraine. However, there's no word on how long he'll be staying. In any case, his interests, his assets, and, most importantly, his people remain here. And judging by the way our government is fighting corruption, the retired "grey cardinal" isn't in any serious danger. Nevertheless, some media outlets have already loudly declared the "Levochkin era" over. But we shouldn't jump to conclusions; it could just be the beginning...
Denis Ivanov, Skelet.Org
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