“Bought from our own, for our own”: in Odessa, millions of public money intended for the Armed Forces of Ukraine were embezzled

For everyone who wants to know the latest news from the city of Odessa, very “interesting” news has appeared. This time it will be useful to read for lovers of the “municipal warta” of the region.

It turns out that during the full-scale invasion, Kuznetsov and Co. made money by purchasing expensive plumbing fixtures and “golden” tracksuits, supposedly for the needs of the defense and self-propelled guns. And in the end they transferred everything to their “Municipal Varta”.

A Ukrainian blogger from Odessa, “Irochka will tell...” writes about this in her Telegram channel.

Here's what the blogger writes:

Today, Kuznetsov’s team is being caught up with Part 2 of Article 191 (misappropriation, embezzlement or taking possession of someone else’s property by an official abusing his official position). There is already an examination and this is good news.

It was established that some of the goods were purchased at inflated prices, some at undervalued prices - most importantly, everything was purchased from our own people. The bottom line is that, according to the Resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers and the Decree of the President, purchases related to defense were carried out without applying the procurement procedures defined by the Laws of Ukraine. And this is logical; in the spring of 2022 it was important to provide for our defenders.

But the guys from the Odessa City Council quickly got their bearings and purchased plumbing fixtures, bath mats, tracksuits, etc. from “their” companies and also earned money from each purchase. Irochka reminds – SPRING 2022. While Odessa residents were hauling sand for barricades from the city’s beaches, the guys from Duma Square were messing around with the purchases.

Next, the director of the Department of Municipal Security OMR Kuznetsov begins procurement. Kuznetsov entrusted control over the implementation to his first deputy, Yuri Savchenko. As a result, 27 contracts were concluded in March-May 2022.

Very angry and very knowledgeable tongues told Irochka that in the first two months of a full-scale war, the leadership of the Munich Security Service had spent more than 2 million hryvnia on these purchases.

What follows is even more interesting. Not only did they purchase from their own people, but what they purchased was given to their own people. If you believe the acts of acceptance and transfer, then, on the basis of concluded agreements, the Department of Municipal Varta OMR (Kuznetsov) transferred the goods to the Voluntary Formation of OMTG “Municipal Varta of Odessa”. And the commander of this volunteer formation was appointed Miroshnichenko, who is the director of the municipal enterprise “Municipal Varta”.

It was Miroshnichenko who addressed letters to the director of the Department of Municipal Varta OMR Kuznetsov about providing personnel for the volunteer formation.