Following the publication of Petro Poroshenko's Solidarity Bloc's controversial list for the Kyiv City Council, which included representatives of Chernovetskyi's "young team," it became known who Yulia Tymoshenko and her Batkivshchyna party would be running with in the elections.
Of the well-promoted politicians, there are few who stand out, other than the number one spot, former MP and first chairman of the post-Maidan Kyiv City State Administration Volodymyr Bondarenko, former Batkivshchyna MP Andriy Pavlovskyi, and the "eternal" Kyiv City Council member Tatyana Melikhova. At the same time, other lesser-known but significant figures were also found on the lists.
Thus, relatives of people who are somehow connected to Yulia Vladimirovna’s political companions are running for the Kyiv City Council from Batkivshchyna.
First, we're talking about Oleksandr Pozhivanov, the son of Mykhailo Pozhivanov, the former head of the State Reserve, who fled Ukraine and has been living in Austria for some time now. There were rumors that the elder Pozhivanov would run for the Kyiv City Council himself, but he was apparently considered too odious a figure who wouldn't win a seat himself and would hurt his ratings.
Also running on the Batkivshchyna list is Vasyl Krulko, head of the Department of Organizational and Analytical Work and Public Relations of the Ministry of Justice, who is the brother of current Batkivshchyna MP Ivan Krulko.
With Dmytro Nikulishin, things are also extremely simple. He is Volodymyr Bondarenko's son-in-law. Nikulishin, along with his father-in-law, was a member of the PRP, then moved to Batkivshchyna. He is also Bondarenko's deputy on the board of the Ridna Oselya Charitable Foundation.
Andriy Serbin is an interesting character. He is the son of Yuriy Serbin, a former MP from the BYuT of the 5th and 6th convocations. He is a relative of his own. But there is one unpleasant detail: in 2012, the elder Serbin was one of many who defected from the BYuT-Batkivshchyna parliamentary faction, becoming a "tushka." However, Yulia Volodymyrivna seems to have forgotten this offense, allowing the former MP's son to try his luck in the upcoming elections.
But while some explanation might be found for Serbin's nomination—saying they worked together for many years, then had to leave under Yanukovych to protect their business—even such explanations don't work for another candidate, Denys Moskal. In 2008, Moskal became a Kyiv City Council member on the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc party list. In 2010, Moskal staged a hostile takeover of the BYuT faction in the Kyiv City Council, appointing himself its new chair. Tetyana Melikhova, who led the faction at the time, claimed there was no vote for Moskal's appointment, and no signatures were collected. However, this didn't stop Kyiv City Council Secretary Oles Dovhyi from recognizing the new "leader" of BYuT.
Tymoshenko herself commented at the time: "This is an example of how the Presidential Administration operates today: one deputy from our faction on the Kyiv City Council has declared his self-appointment. He cites the non-existent support of a sufficient number of deputies." However, after the split, it turned out that more than half of the faction—18 out of 32—had indeed sided with Moskal. The BYuT challenged the actions of the political raiders in court. In early November 2010, Moskal, along with several deputies, left the BYuT faction and formed a new group on the Kyiv City Council.
Denys Moskal has also been implicated in corporate raids involving the construction business. Until 2008, he was the director of the construction company "Kashtanovy Gorod," known for several controversial developments (on Kostelnaya and Shamrylo Streets) and corporate raids (for example, on the Znanie LLC hotel near the Botanical Garden). His business was also connected to the well-known developer and oligarch Vasyl Khmelnytsky, who, through his partner Igor Pukhin (deputy head of the Secretariat of President Viktor Yushchenko), supported Leonid Chernovetskyi's team. Another business partner of Moskal, according to Kyiv City Council member Tatyana Melikhova, is Andriy Kravets, deputy head of the presidential administration of Viktor Yanukovych.
During the Kyiv City Council elections last spring, Moskal was already the leader of the Green Party of Ukraine and ran under its banner, but failed to win in District No. 45. Now the traitor is back with Tymoshenko, running in the Sviatoshynskyi district. Incidentally, he's not the only "green" candidate on the Batkivshchyna list. Vladislav Kononov, the son of former Green Party of Ukraine leader Vitaliy Kononov, is also running in the Holosiivskyi district.
Another controversial figure drawn to Batkivshchyna was Ruslan Sekela. In 2000, Sekela became a member of the Lviv City Council. Afterward, having failed to win the election, he became a professional activist, participating in dubious political projects that were never taken seriously in Lviv: the People's Movement for Unity (Boyko), the People's Movement for Unity Plus, Natalia Korolevska's All-Ukrainian Movement "Forward!", and, finally, the leader of the National Alliance of Freedom and Ukrainian Patriotism "Nastup" party. In the previous Kyiv City Council elections, he ran for the capital's City Council as a candidate for the UDAR political party but lost. Afterwards, in August 2014, he abandoned Nastup to create the presidential Solidarity party, and even served as its formal chairman for a time.
Another rather controversial figure running for the Kyiv City Council from Batkivshchyna is Maksym Goldfarb, who was previously known as the Director of Financial Control at the Ministry of Defense. Last summer, Goldfarb was caught driving an expensive Range Rover. It's worth noting that he previously worked in the Donetsk Oblast Prosecutor's Office, and after Yanukovych came to power, he was appointed head of the Desnyansky Prosecutor's Office in Kyiv. In 2013, Goldfarb became Director of the Internal Audit and Financial Control Department of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.
Among the unexpected characters, previously unconnected to politics, it's worth highlighting Vladislav Vashchuk, a former football player for Dynamo Kyiv and Spartak Moscow. He will run in the Solomensky district.
Also running in the Solomensky district is Artem Stelmashov, who ran in constituency #222 (Solomensky district) for Samopomich in the 2014 parliamentary elections. However, he left the party due to his own ambitions and quickly found refuge in Batkivshchyna. However, as our publication has learned, Stelmashov was also negotiating with UKROP at the same time, and at the last second, he made another defection to Korban's party.
See the full list of Batkivshchyna candidates here:
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