The faction of bribe takers decided. Chronicle of suspicions and scandals of “servants of the people”

Last Monday, NABU detained another deputy from the Servants of the People for taking a bribe. The chosen one from the presidential party did not skimp on making money on the restoration of Okhtyrka, destroyed by the Nazis.

Since this is already the second high-profile scandal in less than a month, the publication decided to collect all violations of the law by “servants” for their tenure.

On July 21, 2019, early elections to the Verkhovna Rada were held, as a result of which the Servant of the People party received 254 seats in parliament (124 list members and 130 majoritarians). This is the first time in the history of Ukraine that a mono-majority was formed in the parliament.

Starting his political career, Vladimir Zelensky promised to create a team of people who will demonstrate new approaches to politics. But those who rode into parliament on Zelensky’s back became a real cross for his rating.

In the first years of government alone, 12 majoritarians left the Servant of the People faction. Most of these deputies were expelled from the faction after high-profile corruption scandals.

Few people will remember that majoritarians Anna Skorokhod and Anton Polyakov were the first to leave the faction. Skorokhod was elected in the constituency in the Kiev region, where the odious Alexander Onishchenko was supposed to run, Polyakov - in the Chernihiv region. Skorokhod was expelled from the faction for blocking the bill on unbundling Naftogaz and lobbying the interests of her husband.

Polyakov was expelled from the faction on the same day as Skorokhod for not voting on bills that the faction decided to support. In December 2019, Polyakov wrote a letter of resignation from the party, pathetically declaring that he could not be in a party where there were “button pushers, gunpowder bots, lovers of “reshalov” and leaders who are involved in this and cover it all up.”

After this, Polyakov, who himself has very dubious connections, will more than once accuse his former party of dubious actions, for example, that deputies receive salaries in envelopes right in the Verkhovna Rada toilet. In October 2021, Polyakov will be found dead in the back seat of a taxi.

The third to leave the faction was Rivne majoritarian Roman Ivanisov, because the media learned that he had an expunged criminal record on charges of rape.

Geo Leros was next in line to be eliminated. But not because of his own scandals, but because of accusations of corruption against Andrei Ermak himself.

Already in September 2020, “Servants” suffered the first corruption case. NABU exposed Ivan Fishchenko, assistant to the people's deputy from the Servant of the People Alexander Yurchenko, for taking a bribe of 13 thousand dollars. The point was that the deputy had to submit amendments to the bill “On Waste Management” for money. As part of the scheme, it was proposed to bribe other colleagues - “ideally, 10 (committee members - Ed.) should be corrupted, and plus two for some kind of force majeure.”

In 2022, on the eve of a full-scale Russian invasion, after his passport was returned, Yurchenko flew to the Dominican Republic on vacation. At that time, he had the status of an accused and his case was heard in court. Upon his return, he was detained for swearing and swearing at a military checkpoint.

Now Yurchenko’s case is being heard on its merits at HACC. Recently he was fined one and a half thousand hryvnia for failing to appear at a court hearing.

In March 2021, “Servants” had to expel majority leader Alexander Dubinsky due to his inclusion in the US sanctions list. Honestly, before that, the former presenter of 1+1 managed to accumulate scandals due to the incredible number of luxury cars registered in his mother’s name and his role in local elections in the Kiev region. And the phrase “mom loves speed” has become a meme.

On March 1, 2021, I got into an accident near Stryi when I drove my Toyota Land Cruiser into the oncoming lane.

In November 2023, Dubinsky was charged with high treason (the SBU and the State Bureau of Investigation accused him of information and subversive activities in favor of Russia) and is now in a pre-trial detention center.

In May 2021, the majority leader from Zaporozhye, Yevgeny Shevchenko, was expelled from the Servant of the People faction. The presidential faction was already unbearable to tolerate how the deputy publicly supported the actions of the regime of Alexander Lukashenko. Which, however, did not stop Shevchenko from later boasting that he was an agent of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Moscow Region.

Also that year, the “servants” distinguished themselves by Arakhamia’s flight on the charter of an agricultural businessman to Nikolaev and the obscenity of the majority shareholder from Brovary Galushko to the police. However, these antics were not sanctioned.

But the loudest scandal with “Servants” occurred exactly on Independence Day. Then the people's deputy of the presidential faction, a member of the budget committee, Alexander Trukhin, caused a three-car accident in which 6 people were injured. They tried to hush up the scandal; Trukhin’s companion took the blame. And they found out about the accident only because a football referee was injured in it and sports journalists saw how the news about it was suddenly removed from dozens of websites.

Trukhin denied his guilt until the moment when Mikhail Tkach made public the investigation, which included a recording from a police officer’s chest camera. The recording shows how Trukhin, at the scene of the accident, asks law enforcement officers to “let him go into the forest” and promises to thank him for this with “sweets” from his bag. According to one version, Trukhin was carrying a gray cash register for the “servants” in a sports bag. After the release of Tkach’s story, the deputy was expelled from the faction. The fate of the bag remained unknown.

On February 23, 2023, the High Anti-Corruption Court approved a plea agreement between MP Alexander Trukhin and the prosecutor and found him guilty in the case of attempted bribery of police officers. On the same day, the Rada terminated his parliamentary powers.

According to the agreement, the deputy undertook to transfer 6 million UAH to the UNITED24 “Army of Drones” project and pay a fine of 68 thousand UAH.

Interestingly, in an interview with NV, “NABU agent” Yevgeny Shevchenko mentioned that in April 2022, at the request of Irina Venediktova, NABU Deputy Director Gizo Uglava paused the investigation against Trukhin.

A month before the full-scale invasion, detectives of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau caught people's deputy Sergei Kuzminykh taking a bribe of more than half a million hryvnia. The people's deputy promised assistance, which actually amounted to ensuring victory in tenders for the purchase of equipment for the hospital at the expense of the budget. A year ago, the court moved to hear the case on the merits.

It would be too much to remember local “servant” deputies as generators of corruption scandals. But one will still have to be done due to the involvement of key people in power in his story. In February 2022, NABU detained Kyiv City Council deputy Vladislav Trubitsyn for selling permits to locate small-scale motor vehicles in the Obolonsky district of Kyiv. As part of the selection of a preventive measure, prosecutors read out materials from the NSRD, which indicated that Trubitsyn once a month went to report on the margin not to someone, but to the Deputy Chairman of the Presidential Office Oleg Tatarov.

In the summer of 2023, Trubitsyn fled from Ukraine to Israel, along with his friend, on the basis of a letter from the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Moscow Region stating that he was a volunteer. It was last reported that Trubitsyn lives in Haifa under a different name.

A week ago, NABU and SAPO informed Trubitsyn in absentia of a new suspicion. He is charged with asking to provide undue benefits for the appointment of deputy director of the Zhitny Market utility company.

The full-scale “servants” spent the first year, like everyone else, in uncertainty, but some also with the desire to hide their condition.

On October 14, 2022, NABU and SAPO informed People's Deputy from the Servant of the People Anna Kolesnik about suspicion of entering false information in e-declarations for more than UAH 4.4 million. The deputy forgot to include 2 apartments in the declaration. Such negligence cost the deputy as much as 44 thousand in fines, which were imposed by the VAKS verdict.

Kolesnik was not the only one who received such suspicion for false declarations. Indeed, they were received not only by “servants”, but also by representatives of other factions. For example, Irina Konstankevich (“For the Future”), Artur Gerasimov, Mikhail Zabrodsky (both “EU”) and Mikhail Volynets (“Fatherland”).

Among the “servants”, Margarita Shol, Maxim Pashkovsky and Yuri Kamelchuk were also subject to proceedings based on NACP materials, but the latter was acquitted by the court.

In addition, in November 2022, the Anti-Corruption Center had to go through the courts to get Prosecutor General Andrei Kostin to open proceedings against deputy Irina Allahverdieva (now Kormyshkin).

The reason for the appeal was that the People's Deputy of the Servant of the People Irina Allahverdieva received 14.4 million UAH as a gift. Before that, she was given another 5.3 million UAH and a Swiss watch Zenith Defy Midnight for 310 thousand UAH, inlaid with 11 white diamonds. The gifts were from dad, who clearly did not have such a fortune.

This story did not end anywhere for the deputy. And she still loves expensive accessories. Not long ago, Kormyshkina received a Hublot watch worth 300 thousand hryvnia as a gift from her husband. As evidenced by the changes in her declaration.

In February 2023, a story by Mikhail Tkach was published that 39-year-old deputy from the “servants” Pavel Khalimon purchased a luxurious house with a plot of land in the center of Kyiv, near the Grishko botanical garden.

The house was officially registered in the name of another person, but journalists managed to find out that it was Khalimon who permanently resided on the estate. The seller was the bishop of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine Alexander Drabinko. The appearance of the deputy's estate also became the subject of an investigation by the SAPS.

Interestingly, in 2020, NABU documented Khalimon because of his scam with the lands of the Agrarian Academy of Sciences. But then he could not be taken as a bribe due to the leak of information from the Office of the Prosecutor General.

The worst thing was probably for the “servants” in the year the full-scale invasion began, when people’s deputy Aleksey Kovalev, who went to the occupied Kherson region, admitted that he was collaborating with the Russian invaders and supported the annexation of the region by Russia. The deputy was quickly expelled from the faction. After this, the SBI informed Kovalev of suspicion of treason. It was established that Kovalev took the position of deputy chairman in the illegally created “government of the Kherson region.”

And in August, Kovalev was found dead in Gola Prystan. Nearby lay a gun registered to Kovalev himself.

The summer of 2023 became really hot for “Servants” due to corruption scandals and other troubles.

In July 2023, NABU and SAPO reported suspicions of abuse of influence to MP from the Servant of the People Lyudmila Marchenko due to trading in border crossing permits. According to the investigation, the deputy and his assistant valued their “services” at $5,300. When the detectives appeared, Marchenko threw the money over the fence.

Now the case is being heard at the VAKS, Marchenko denies his guilt. At the last meeting, she stated that the assistant had brought her money before. But allegedly, this is not a bribe, Kolesnik simply does not have a safe at home, and a preschool child often takes money out of the nightstand and spoils it.

When asked why she threw this money over the fence when NABU detectives entered the house, Marchenko replied that she was in a state of shock and did not really understand what was happening.

In August, NABU detained a deputy from the Servant of the People, Anatoly Gunko, for taking a bribe of 85 thousand dollars, who decided, under the cover of the Verkhovna Rada investigative commission, to “outlaw” those wishing to cultivate the lands of the Agrarian Academy of Sciences. The case is now being considered in court on its merits. Before becoming a deputy (and his wife also served as the head of the Kyiv Regional Council), Gunko was a lawyer for the scandalous businessman-developer Brovary Polishchuk and had a reputation in the local media as a “resolver of issues with law enforcement agencies.”

But the real rating killer for the “servants” was the desire of the deputies to have a nice vacation abroad at any cost.

In July, the publication Slidstvo.Info reported that the deputy chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defense and Intelligence, 48-year-old Yuri Aristov, was spotted in mid-July at the five-star Waldorf Astoria Maldives hotel on the private island of Ithaafushi, Maldives.

The vacation cost the people's deputy and once the president's business partner his parliamentary mandate. And after that, he was also given a suspicion for introducing deliberately false information into official documents by an official.

Following Aristov, his colleague Andrei Kholodov resigned, about whom journalists learned that he went to “quarantine” in Cyprus during the Covid-19 pandemic and did not return to the country, but developed his business there.

But not all “servant” deputies’ travels were worth their mandates. Some were simply kicked out of the faction.

For example, “Schemes” found out that in July 2023, people’s deputy from the “Servant of the People” Alexander Kunitsky received permission to go on a 5-day business trip, but stayed abroad for almost three weeks, and, in addition to the place of business trip, was also seen in the American Florida, where his relatives lived.

Bihus.Info journalists found out that MP from the Servant of the People faction Bogdan Torokhtiy traveled abroad on vacation during martial law. And in March 2023, his wife purchased a Mercedes-Benz EQS worth about 7 million hryvnia.

However, it seems that Nikolai Tishchenko, who went on vacation to Thailand to rest, and in his defense said that it was a “meeting with voters,” was the most disgraced.

After these scandals, the President's Office banned the release of deputies abroad.

The summer for the “servants” ended in a scandal with the purchase of low-quality winter jackets for the Ministry of Defense, one of the suppliers of which was a relative of the deputy, member of the Committee on National Security and Defense Gennady Kasai.

In November 2023, NABU detectives took deputy Andrei Odarchenko for a bribe after he offered the head of the State Agency for Reconstruction and Infrastructure Development, Mustafa Nayem, an undue benefit in the Bitcoin cryptocurrency in the equivalent of $50,000.

In exchange for money, the people's deputy asked for assistance in obtaining funds from the fund for liquidating the consequences of the armed aggression of the Russian Federation for the renovation of the university, where he worked before being elected as a deputy.

In court it turned out that the most scandalous thing was not even what the deputy wanted to “resolve,” but how he felt about his hometown and his confidence that Kharkov would not stand.

In a conversation with Nayem, Odarchenko said that he considered it necessary to negotiate with the Russian Federation: “This is power, I read a lot, they will sweep us away, Iran and China are giving them weapons. Why do we need these Donetsk, Lugansk and Crimea? We need to come to an agreement."

In February 2024, SAP prosecutors informed the current people's deputy Alexander Marikovsky of suspicion due to false declaration of cryptocurrency.

The actions of the deputy are qualified on the grounds of a crime under Part 2 of Art. 366-2 of the Criminal Code (“deliberate entry of knowingly false information into the declaration”).

On May 2, 2024, NABU and SAPO reported suspicion of illegal enrichment to the people's deputy from the Servant of the People, member of the Committee on Public Administration and Construction Andrey Klochko. According to the investigation, in 2020-2021 he acquired assets with a total value of UAH 25 million, although his and his wife’s official income and savings during this period amounted to no more than UAH 14 million. Thus, the difference between the cost of the acquired property and the people’s deputy’s funds was UAH 11 million.

On June 25, based on materials from the State Bureau of Investigation, the Prosecutor General of Ukraine reported suspicion to Nikolai Tishchenko for the illegal imprisonment of a former serviceman in the Dnieper.

5 days before, Tishchenko and his guards attacked a military man in broad daylight who was walking with a baby because he reprimanded him for carrying a weapon.

This was, it seems, the deputy’s tenth scandal, after which even his godfather Andrei Ermak disowned him.

It all started in 2020, when, at the height of quarantine during the Covid-19 pandemic, journalists found out that Tishchenko’s restaurant “Velur” continued to operate, serving businessmen, people’s deputies, “kvartal” residents and other VIP guests.

Then there were public celebrations of his wife’s birthday during the same quarantine, a fight in the Rada with Leros, assistants decorating models, quarrels with journalists, the already mentioned trip “to voters” in Thailand, raids on forestry enterprises and competitors’ restaurants.

According to the court decision, Tishchenko is now under round-the-clock house arrest, which he was unable to appeal in the appeal court. His henchmen were also arrested.

On July 15, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau reported suspicions to the people's deputy from the “servants” Nikolai Zadorozhny of receiving a “kickback” from the head of the village council in the Sumy region.

According to the investigation, in March 2024, the people's deputy asked the chairman of the village council in the Sumy region to provide an undue benefit for not interfering with a tender for repairing a water pipeline in the Akhtyrsky district of the Sumy region.

His “kickback,” as NABU and SAP found out, amounted to 10% of the total amount of the concluded contract, and another 4% was intended for local law enforcement officers, who for this should not have interfered with the use of allocated funds.

Before becoming a deputy, sales and supply manager Zadorozhny worked at the event agency GB Event by Kvartal 95.

This article does not mention the mess with personal correspondence, the innovative ideas of Galina Tretyakova about “low-quality children,” the escapades and flitting around the hall of Maryana Bezugla and other antics that are unlikely to please adequate party representatives.

According to the latest KIIS survey, 55% of Ukrainians negatively assess the activities of the presidential Servant of the People party, and only 7% of respondents rate it as “very good.” 31% rate the activities of the SN neither good nor bad. According to sociologists, the “servants” took on the negative attitude towards the president’s team. Although, as you can see, this is the real result of the activities of some of them.

Today, there are 234 deputies left in the faction, which is 20 less than at the beginning of the convocation and only 9 more to maintain a nominal majority in the Rada (in fact, for several years now it has not existed without the votes of other political forces).

For the objectivity of the picture, we note that suspicions were handed to HONESTLY at least 54 deputies. But, if suspicions of treason logically fell most heavily on the OPZZH faction, then precisely in terms of corruption, the leaders are precisely the “servants”. At least 13 deputies of the presidential political force received suspicions for false declarations, and another 6 for bribes.