The Supreme Commercial Court upheld the right of Kadans Company LLC to carry out nominally illegal construction in the Central Park of Culture and Recreation on Grushevsky Street.
Due to the negligence or deliberate inaction of Kyiv City Council and Kyiv City State Administration (KCSA) officials, a private developer may soon erect a three-story building with a parking garage on the site of a chess pavilion that burned down last century. Former business partners of Kyiv City Council Environmental Commission member Denys Moskal (Batkivshchyna) intend to undertake the construction. Moskal himself denies any involvement in the project.
As KV has discovered, the Supreme Commercial Court made the decision “to consider the expired land lease agreement with Kadans Company LLC as valid again” on June 30, 2016, in case No. 910/31828/15.
Thus, the Supreme Commercial Court upheld the decisions of the two previous courts in the claim of Kadans Company LLC against the Kyiv City Council for the recognition of the renewal of the land lease agreement of June 26, 1999. The land in question concerns a 0,10-hectare plot of land allocated to Kadans Company LLC by Kyiv City Council decision No. 225/326 of April 29, 1999, for a 15-year lease for the reconstruction and subsequent operation of the chess pavilion (later a chess club) on Hrushevsky Street in the Central Park of Culture and Leisure.
The site once housed a chess pavilion, which burned down. The project called for a three-story building with a total floor area of 2,1 square meters, including two underground levels. The building was planned to include underground parking, a gym, tournament rooms, a conference hall, and relaxation areas for grandmasters.
Until 2014, the lessee was unable to build anything in the park. In 2014, Kadans Company LLC petitioned the Kyiv City Council to renew the lease for the same period and under the same conditions. Since the Kyiv City Council dismissed the petition, the company filed a lawsuit.
The Kyiv City Commercial Court upheld the claim of this LLC by a decision dated 21.12.2015, and the Kyiv Commercial Court of Appeal upheld the decision of the court of first instance by a ruling dated 14.04.2016.
The courts at all three levels of jurisdiction relied on the fact that the Kyiv City Council failed to provide correspondence with Kadans Company outlining objections to the lease renewal, even though the LLC had a preferential right to renew it. The court also disregarded the letter from the Kyiv City State Administration's Department of Land Resources dated December 7, 2015, regarding lease violations, as it did not originate with the landlord (the Kyiv City Council).
The courts also ignored the Kyiv City Council's arguments that the chess club had still not been built. It turns out the contract did not specify a specific construction deadline. Meanwhile, the plaintiff, Kadans Company LLC, provided the court with evidence of the development of construction design documentation, receipt of urban planning conditions and development restrictions from the Kyiv City State Administration, and a construction permit.
Representatives of the Kyiv City Council also attempted to cite the Kyiv City Council's decision of January 22, 2015, "On the introduction of a temporary ban (moratorium) on the construction and sale of land plots within the protected (buffer) zones of Kyiv," but the court found it unproven that the land specified in the lawsuit was within the protected zone.
As a reminder, the city's leadership has been promising for years to delineate the boundaries of Kyiv's parks and register them in the State Land Cadastre to protect against illegal development. However, with rare exceptions, this never happens. Therefore, the court considers the designated area not de jure Central Park land.
Overall, analyzing the court materials, one can conclude that if representatives of the Kyiv City Council and the Kyiv City State Administration had, after the lease agreement expired, taken steps to terminate it in a coordinated and established manner, and then ensured the return of the land plot to municipal ownership, the decision of the Supreme Commercial Court might have been different.
As *KV has discovered, the current founders of Kadans Company LLC are the Cypriot company Nambel Holdings Limited (99,9%) and Borey Scientific Society LLC. The registered ultimate beneficiaries are the owners of Nambel Holdings Limited: Kyiv resident Vladislava Molchanova and Lithuanians Marina Pozdnyakova and Raimondas Tumenas.
It should be noted that Raimondas Tumenas is known as a former shareholder of the juice producer Sandora, which acquired the development company Stolitsa Group in 2013.
According to media reports, Vladyslava Molchanova is a business partner of Kyiv City Council member Denys Moskal (VOO Batkivshchyna faction), who led the Green Party of Ukraine from 2011 to 2014. In 2006, Molchanova was the CEO of the construction company Stolitsa, and since 2013, its managing partner.
As a reminder, on April 5, 2016, the Kyiv Commercial Court invalidated the Kyiv City Council's decision to grant park status to a 0,94-hectare plot of land at 44-b Heroiv Stalinhrada Avenue, and recognized Soul LLC's right to use it for the construction of a residential complex.
The founders of the company "Soul" are Vladimir Rubinstein and "Elakol Developments Limited." The beneficiaries of "Soul" are Vladimir Rubinstein, Vladislava Molchanova, and Lithuanian citizens Marina Poznyakova and Raimondas Tumenas.
It's also worth noting that in July 2013, the Supreme Commercial Court was less favorable to the aforementioned businessmen, ordering Kashtanovy Gorod LLC to return to the Kyiv City Council a 15,97-hectare parcel of recreational land (including a lake) located on Pravdy Street (Sine Lake) in Kyiv's Podilskyi District. The reason was the tenant's prolonged inactivity.
The owners of the company "Kashtanovy Gorod" are also the Cypriot company "Nambel Holdings Limited" (99,9%) and LLC "Development Company "Bazis" (0,1%). "Bazis" is owned by the Cypriot company "Elakol Developments Limited" and Vladislava Molchanova, who ran for Kyiv City Council as a Green Party candidate in 2006.
At the time the land plot was acquired, the director of "Kashtanovy Gorod" was Denys Moskal, then chairman of the "Republic of Kyiv" parliamentary faction in the Kyiv City Council and chairman of the Green Party. The company's primary owner (50%) was Liliya Romanyuk, who shared the same registered address with Molchanova.
It is known that Nambel Holdings Limited and Elakol Developments Limited also jointly own Instrument Invest LLC, Stolitsa LLC, and Stolichnaya Perspektiva LLC.
When asked to comment on his involvement in the construction of the "Chess Club" in Kyiv's Central Park, Denis Moskal told KV the following:
"I have no connection whatsoever with this company (Kadans Company LLC) or with chess clubs. As you know, the State Register contains all information about individual entrepreneurs and legal entities, right down to the owner. I am neither the owner, founder, nor an official of this company. This can be easily verified in the register."
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