Sergey Levochkin
Levochkin can in some ways be compared to the iconic figure of Russian politics, Surkov.
The country's collapse, civil war, and economic collapse are now associated with the fugitive Viktor Yanukovych or the current team of Petro Poroshenko. Everything depends on political preferences and personal identity. However, the man who influenced national decision-making THEN and still influences these decisions almost as much NOW – Serhiy Lyovochkin – has strangely found himself outside the purview of public opinion and the media.
Sergei Levochkin can be compared, in some ways, to the iconic figure of Russian politics, Vladislav Surkov. Both have the image of young, intellectual intriguers, the only difference being that Surkov's "habitat" is much more relaxed—Putin-Medvedev/Putin-Putin—while Levochkin must navigate a polar opposite—from ardent supporters of Moscow to even more ardent admirers of Brussels and Washington.
Who needs a person?
The rise of former head of the Presidential Administration Yanukovych is often linked to the name of his late father, Police Colonel General Volodymyr Lyovochkin, who for a long time headed the State Department for Corrections. The widespread legend that the chief prison official knew "everything" about Yanukovych, which opened a broad path to big-time politics for Serhiy Lyovochkin, seems rather naive.
If only because Yanukovych, with all his criminal records, became public knowledge immediately after he first became Ukraine's prime minister. For example, the daughters of one of Yanukovych's closest friends, Vasyl Dzharty, Viktoria and Olha, unlike Serhiy Lyovochkin, never achieved any political clout in Ukraine. All this suggests that, in addition to his family background, Lyovochkin possesses personal qualities that allow him to fit into the highest echelons of power and subsequently manipulate them.
To illustrate Lyovochkin's talents, it's worth noting that at 27, Serhiy became a "scientific consultant" to Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma. He also became close to the head of the Presidential Administration, Volodymyr Lytvyn, from whom he learned much about adapting to changing circumstances. Tellingly, after the Orange Revolution, which ousted many of Kuchma's supporters, Lyovochkin became an advisor to Verkhovna Rada Speaker Lytvyn, and in 2006, he even achieved 13th place on the list in the bloc of the same name. The bloc failed to enter parliament at the time, but in 2006, Lyovochkin became the head of the administration for the newly appointed Prime Minister, Yanukovych.
What's interesting about these fluctuations is Levochkin's unique ability to always stay not just afloat, but in the wake of the teams implementing real policy in the country. At the same time, Levochkin was pursuing two other activities that made him a significant figure in Ukrainian politics: placing his people in key sectoral positions and building a family business empire.
"Lyovochkin's people" are represented in virtually all key areas of state affairs. Before Yanukovych's flight, he had interests (through his sister Yulia, a current member of parliament) in Ukroboronservis. Lyovochkin's relatives were connected to Naftogaz, which was until recently headed by Yuriy Boyko.
Levochkin developed an even closer relationship with the "family" oligarch Dmitry Firtash, with whom they both successfully wrested the Inter TV channel from Valeriy Khoroshkovsky, and made their "proper income" through the intermediary schemes of RosUkrEnergo.
Levochkin created a completely convoluted array of financial and consulting companies with a wide variety of specializations. Levochkin's business empire is unique in that it doesn't consist of any specific key areas, but is all-encompassing, essentially duplicating the Ukrainian state's corrupt system. Levochkin created his own "family" within the more well-known and now household name of the Yanukovych clan. The only difference is that public opinion turned to hatred for the former president and all his businesses, while Levochkin's "family" masterfully evaded the attack.
Always in trend
Even during Kuchma's late reign, officials, politicians, and businessmen began to say that some wily "young Serhiy" was determining who could talk to Leonid Danilovich and who couldn't. Levochkin fine-tuned this system starting in 2010, when he headed Yanukovych's presidential administration, and remained with him almost until his fall in 2014.
Essentially, throughout Yanukovych's three years as president, Lyovochkin filtered the flow of "clients" for communication with the head of state and provided "correct characterizations" of them. This means that the overall informational picture of the country for the head of state was shaped by his chief of staff.
It's worth noting that during this same period, Yanukovych signed the rather geopolitically dubious Kharkiv Agreements with Russia, which extended the presence of the neighboring state's military contingent in Crimea. Soon after, Yanukovych's frantic vacillations over the Association Agreement with the EU began, which escalated from the signing of a technical intergovernmental document into the most severe political crisis in Ukraine's history.
Finally, Lyovochkin's position during the "stand on the Maidan" was quite strange. While Yanukovych's team was pondering how to get people to go home, the wife of the head of the presidential administration, even before Victoria Nuland, was handing out cookies to protesters on the Maidan. And characteristically, throughout the entire standoff between the opposition and the government, right up until February 22, when Yanukovych fled, opposition media (and there were some under the "tyrant" Yanukovych) made no mention of Lyovochkin. The man who, until his resignation on January 17, effectively set the president's schedule and provided him with the information on what was happening, found himself completely immune from opposition criticism.
In a similarly "strange" way, Maidan activists failed to visit Lyovochkin's country house, despite happily visiting Viktor Medvedchuk, who has held no official government position since 2005. Lyovochkin was also bypassed by another strange body—Yegor Sobolev's lustration committee.
At the same time, Lyashko's name is beginning to be associated with a new, odious contemporary political project—the "Lyashko phenomenon." Oleh Lyashko himself is a character worthy of a separate narrative. And demand for such politicians is generally always high among certain segments of society. But Lyashko, using his media empire, is transforming this clown politician into a project that could soon take first place in the parliamentary re-elections. Essentially, Lyashko is deliberately devaluing Ukrainian patriotism, reducing it to blanket populism and comedic chicanery.
It's unlikely that the intellectual Levochkin sees Lyashko as a long-term political project of national significance, a la the Party of Regions. But in the wake of Ukraine's rapid somalization, people like Lyashko discredit the country's overall Western development vector. Moreover, by garnering massive protest votes from Western voters, the seemingly insane Lyashko becomes a natural ally for Poroshenko against the growing Privat Group. This automatically gives Levochkin renewed access to the country's most powerful figure. And it's entirely possible that after the snap parliamentary elections, it will be Levochkin who will once again begin determining who is allowed an audience with Ukraine's leader.
Igor Lesev, Ukraine News -From-UA
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