The State Property Fund's zeal is clearly fueled by "interested parties" who are waiting for the moment when the sanatoriums and recreation centers that were condemned can be privatized for pennies.
Vacations at resorts are coming to an end – all sanatoriums may soon be converted into expensive hotels for the rich and all sorts of “rental houses”.
The State Property Fund is trying, by hook or by crook, to seize the last remaining assets from the Federation of Trade Unions through the courts. Experts agree: the SPF's zeal is clearly fueled by "interested parties" who are eagerly awaiting the moment when the sanatoriums and recreation centers that were previously seized can be privatized for a pittance, and then sold or repurposed at a lucrative price. Instead of health resorts – billions in accounts? According to preliminary estimates by analysts, the profit margin from such transactions will amount to billions of hryvnias. Everyone will benefit: the prosecutors who are bombarding the courts with lawsuits against the FTUU, the State Property Fund, and—most importantly—influential and wealthy individuals, including politicians and big business leaders, who have long had their eye on the union's property. The only people left to suffer will be ordinary Ukrainians, who even in Soviet times were respectfully referred to as workers. They won't have enough time in their lifetime to save up for a vacation at a commercial price. And the access to sanatoriums, where entire families have flocked for decades, will be closed forever. This fact, against the backdrop of a escalating crisis, declining living standards, high medication costs, and the simple impossibility of receiving treatment, means one thing: people are doomed to die rapidly from chronic and related illnesses. "The Federation of Trade Unions has a unique network of health resorts that can literally bring people back to life," the FTU told us. "The sanatoriums and resorts employ tens of thousands of medical professionals who have specialized in specialized spa treatments for many years. They not only monitor people on vacation, they treat them, conduct a full diagnostic of the body, and restore them. Each vacationer is accompanied by several specialists. It is not uncommon for them to find and eliminate the source of a disease that has plagued a person for years. This is a unique resource—such specialists are unavailable anywhere else. If the trade union health resorts are taken over by the state—and then by a third of the government—these specialists will naturally be out of work. The expensive hotels that specialized sanatoriums are converted into don't need doctors—ten to twenty maids and administrators will be enough. The health of the nation will be ruined." However, who cares about such a trifle, such an abstraction as “the health of the nation,” if we are talking about a multi-billion dollar interest. Why was this absurd situation possible? Why did the state suddenly find itself accomplice to corrupt officials who, through the prosecutor's office and in the name of the State Property Fund, are literally destroying a vital sector? What does the law say about this? Squeeze tactics The piquancy of the situation lies precisely in the fact that the law is, in a sense, ambiguous. This is what the State Property Fund and the prosecutor's office are exploiting, wresting ever more assets from the trade unions. A little history. In 1991, the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR decreed that all property of public organizations would be considered state property. This provision is still invoked to this day by those seeking to decimate Ukrainian trade unions. However, they completely overlook the fact that just the day before, in 1990, the All-Union Confederation of Trade Unions transferred all property to the control of Ukrainian trade unions. And no one else has the right to claim it. Moreover, if we're going to look at Soviet norms, neither the Constitution nor the Civil Code of the Ukrainian SSR will you find a statement that the state has the right to encroach on trade union property. It has always been considered a separate form of property and has never been state property. Never—even under all-consuming socialism! However, under socialism, they didn't know how to calculate the profits from selling public health resorts. Today, however, is a different matter. "The State Property Fund had been encroaching on our property for a long time; lawsuits erupted from time to time, but we were generally successful in defending our rights," the Federation of Trade Unions' legal service explained. "With the 'Donetsk team' coming to power, everything changed. These politicians and their associated business structures stopped at nothing to seize anything of major commercial interest. They had long been skilled in the art of 'squeezing,' so resisting them was difficult. In 2011, a powerful attack began against us. It began in Crimea—the peninsula's then-prime minister (a member of the Party of Regions, of course) was actively seeking to personally control numerous health resorts, some of which belonged to the Federation of Trade Unions. The Prosecutor General picked up the baton—he, too, became interested in trade union resources, and this time throughout the country. The prosecutor's office inundated the courts with lawsuits in the interests of the State Property Fund—dozens, then hundreds, of lawsuits began to be filed for the alienation of property. We spent a lot of money and effort on handling them (we spent over 3 million UAH on paying the court fees for filing appeals and cassation complaints). A new broom sweeps the same way When the new government came to power, everyone thought it had finally left the trade unions alone, according to the Federation. "In April of this year, we started winning cases," union lawyers explained. "We won five or six. And then something else happened. It turned out the new government's methods and tactics were little different from those of the old ones. We've been pushed back again. Trade union assets continue to tickle the appetites of the powers that be." A new wave of legal battles, in which trade unions are the losing side, has erupted with the appointment of a certain Oleg Bachun as Deputy Prosecutor General. According to trade union leaders, it is he who is initiating the lawsuits and attempting to leave the FTU with nothing. It's hard to believe in the selflessness and purity of this servant of Themis. Oleg Bachun is a well-known figure, long since labeled in the press as a corrupt official with a colossal fortune. Bachun's biography is rich and varied, replete with facts that should long ago have attracted the attention of the relevant authorities. Today, as Deputy Prosecutor General, Mr. Bachun has focused all his energy on "restoring justice"—returning trade union property, allegedly, to state ownership. Why "allegedly"? Because the State Property Fund, which is trying to seize the property, can't keep it on its balance sheet. What does this really mean? Experts predict that the resorts and sanatoriums will immediately be put up for privatization. Incidentally, a privatization boom is expected next year—the state plans to receive almost 20 billion hryvnias from privatization. Whether it will receive it is a separate question. But according to experts, everyone with influence in politics and business is already actively preparing for the process. Economic expert Volodymyr Tsybulko suggests that the hryvnia has even been devalued for the upcoming privatization—to make it cheaper to buy state property. The result: health resorts purchased for devalued hryvnias will be quickly transformed into "elite recreation and entertainment centers" that can be sold for much more money. "If this happens, the resort industry in Ukraine will effectively collapse," predicts the Federation of Trade Unions. "Therefore, we will fight in court to the bitter end. We hope that justice will ultimately be on our side."
