Amber, criminal showdowns, boxing, parliament, participation in tenders and connections with Russia. All these seemingly incompatible things concern one person - Vladimir Prodivus, a former people's deputy from the Party of Regions. Some media outlets claim that he has a Russian passport, but there was no evidence of this. However, facts have been found that indisputably indicate that Prodivus is conducting business in occupied Crimea, having registered it under Russian law.
Vladimir Prodivus is known for being the chairman of Mostobud OJSC, the country's main enterprise specializing in the design and repair of bridges. In addition, he was a people's deputy from the Party of Regions in 2012-2014, as well as a person involved in several journalistic investigations in which he was associated with the amber mafia. Officially related to department stores and markets in Vinnitsa and to the enterprise that produces Regina mineral water.
The surname Prodivus also appears on the infamous tapes of Major Melnichenko, which were recorded in the office of the then President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma. The late General Kravchenko reports to Kuchma that Prodivus is a thief in law and controls the entire economy of the Vinnytsia region: “This means that the economy of the region was captured by a certain Prodivus, a thief in law. This means that the shops are in the center of Vinnitsa. Markets it. Regina water is his. …. The task is to destroy the economy of this Prodivus. Well, the bandit commands the area. It was then that grew year after year on the contradictions between Matvienko (former regional governor - Ed.) and the governor. And it grew!”
The personality of Vladimir Prodivus is quite scandalous. It was he who, while in the position of people's deputy, appeared in the video of the showdown between Rivne amber diggers. It clearly shows how he manages the process, without even hiding his face.
There is another story connected with Prodivous amber. For the wedding of the stepson of the state traitor and, concurrently, Putin’s godfather, Viktor Medvedchuk, Prodivus gave the newlyweds their portraits made from these expensive yellow stones as a gift.
In May 2022, when Russia had already been fully invading Ukraine for three months, Prodivus, who at that time headed the Ukrainian Boxing Federation, received an award from the hands of a Russian, the President of the International Boxing Association, Umar Kremlev.
But the purpose of this material is to show facts indicating that Prodivus not only has an indirect affection for the “Russian world”, but he actually replenishes the Russian budget with taxes, at the expense of which the soldiers of the aggressor country kill Ukrainian citizens.
Officially, according to register data, Vladimir Prodivus and members of his family own more than two dozen companies. The business is very diverse - from trade in goods to rental, construction and even pharmaceuticals. In this context, it was very interesting to explore the history of Prodivus companies registered in the now occupied Crimea.
There are five Crimean companies whose founder was Vladimir Prodivus. The first of them should be Sprint LLC, registered in occupied Simferopol since 2003, which, according to registers, continues to operate to this day. The company's activity is the construction of residential and non-residential premises.
As of May 2022, the founders of the Crimean Sprint LLC are Vladimir Prodivus, Svetlana Ostrovskaya, with Crimean registration, and Vladimir Shcherbakov, also living in Simferopol.
In turn, Svetlana Ostrovskaya is the founder of Priboy-2002 LLC, which is also registered in Simferopol and is engaged in leasing real estate. Registered in the city of Evpatoria.
At the same time, according to Russian registers, the same Svetlana Ostrovskaya is the head of the clone company Priboy-2002 LLC, which was re-registered under the laws of the occupier’s country in December 2014. Moreover, as the data show, this company has positive dynamics and from 2015 to 2022 showed virtually only growth. The compilers of the Russian register note that at least since 2017, the source of accounting reports is Rosstat and the Federal Tax Service of the Russian Federation. Therefore, there is no doubt that Vladimir Prodivus’s business partner in Ukrainian companies is simultaneously operating in occupied Crimea.
Further more. From 2015 to December 2020, a company identical to the one owned by Prodivus in Ukraine also operated in Simferopol. We are talking about Sprint LLC, which is engaged in construction. In 2016 and 2017, Russian justice sued this company for debts.
At the same time, Prodivus’s third partner in the Ukrainian company Sprint, Vladimir Shcherbakov, is associated with a number of other companies in occupied Crimea, which may be within the sphere of influence of Vladimir Prodivus. At least one of them definitely belongs to those officially owned by the former MP and his wife.
Thus, since March 2015, Shcherbakov has been the head of the Crimean Park Hotel LLC. This company is registered in Simferopol and owns a hotel. According to Russian registers, the company has two founders - Prodivus Vladimir Stepanovich and Prodivus Svetlana Vladimirovna. The hotel with these founders operated in Crimea until October 2021. That is, at least another 7 years after Russia annexed the Ukrainian peninsula.
And what is curious is that both Prodivus and his wife have individual tax numbers registered under Russian law. Otherwise, next to their last names it would be indicated that they are not citizens of the Russian Federation, but foreigners. This is a beacon indicating that the Prodivuses may have Russian passports.
According to the Ukrainian registry, Park Hotel LLC was registered in 2005. The hotel is located in the resort town of Alushta. The Prodivus family owned it from at least 2007 to 2021. In 2022, he was transferred to another resident of Vinnitsa, in which, as already noted, the former people’s deputy is known as a “criminal authority.” According to Ukrainian databases, the LLC operating the hotel continues to operate as of March 1, 2024.
It is interesting that the above-mentioned business partner of Prodivus, Vladimir Shcherbakov, is also the head of Bridge Construction Squad No. 122 LLC in Crimea. Russian registries report that its founder is the Civil Construction Mechanization Management LLC from Ukraine. Let us remind you that Prodivus has long been considered the owner of Mostobud, which won numerous contracts for the reconstruction and repair of bridges in Ukraine.
In Ukraine, Vladimir Prodivus also owns companies involved in the production of mineral water under the Regina brand. The co-founder of one of the companies, Regina-PRO LLC, is a Crimean woman, Jurai Inna Nikolaevna.
At the same time, Jurai is a private entrepreneur in Crimea, registered there under Russian law since 2015. Type of activity: real estate rental. That is, at the same time, a woman manages a Ukrainian enterprise and pays taxes to the Russian budget.
Jurai is also a co-founder of the Ukrainian LLC Kafa-Pharm PRO, where Vladimir Prodivus is its partner. The company was originally registered in Feodosia, but has been closed since 2013.
At the same time, in 2014, a company with a similar name “Kafa-Farm” was registered in Feodosia. As of now, it is operational and employs 22 employees. The area of activity is the sale of medicines in pharmacies and, judging by the map, it is a network of pharmacies that continues to trade in the occupied Crimea.
According to information from boxing functionary and head of the public organization Boxing Federation of Ukraine Kirill Shevchenko, Vladimir Prodivus left Ukraine at the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, but returned for a while.
Prodivus himself, after hugging the head of the Russian boxing organization, began to talk about patriotism and the fact that he had stopped doing business in Russia.
But the documents won't lie. And, as we see, neither the annexation of the Ukrainian Crimea by the Russian Federation, nor a full-fledged war of the invaders forced Vladimir Prodivus to renounce the companies paying taxes to the occupiers. Although, if the information that he has a passport with a double-headed eagle in his pocket is true, then such business methods are not at all surprising.
