Millions on fire escapes: how Sergei Kruk and Andrei Zalessky “stirred up” delicious tenders during the war

While volunteer collections are closing more and more difficultly and Ukrainians are dumping hryvnias on a drone, in high offices they are thinking about how to get something cheap for as much as possible.

During a period of catastrophic shortage of money in the budget of Ukraine, when millions of people every day make donations for the needs of the military, there continue to be those who are not stopped by all this from stealing hundreds of millions of hryvnia from the treasury. Corruption in government bodies during the brutal full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation in Ukraine is demotivating, but it is necessary to continue to identify it, write and talk about it in order to stop everyone who decides to rob their country at such a difficult time for it.

And that's the story. At least a quarter of a billion hryvnia were stolen by top officials of the State Emergency Service in 2023 in collusion with a private company. And there is a high probability that this year the State Emergency Service will continue to implement its scheme for purchasing firefighting ladders at prices that are almost doubled.

How Promenergooborudovanie LLC of Andrei Zalisky began to receive almost all government orders from the State Emergency Service of Ukraine
As soon as on February 16, 2022, the head of the State Emergency Service in the Rivne region, Sergei Kruk, known for owning a large amount of real estate, which does not correspond to his income, was appointed by the Cabinet of Ministers to position of head of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, things immediately went up for his fellow countryman, a native of the city of Rivne, Andrey Zalisky, founder and director of Promenergooborudovanie LLC, engaged in the import and trade of fire-fighting equipment. If in the period 2018-2021 the company’s maximum revenue reached UAH 60 million, then in 2022 there was a sharp jump to UAH 453 million.

Such amazing business growth during the period of a full-scale war is easy to explain - Promenergooborudovanie LLC, with the appointment of Sergei Kruk, became the “darling” of the State Emergency Service, to which rescuers began to give almost all of their government orders. In 2022, Zalessky’s company supplied the State Emergency Service with fire axes and fire belts, three tactical works Magirus Wolf R1 for a total amount of 32.5 million UAH. and 20 fire extinguishing systems for another 66 million UAH.

In the fall of 2022, 17 regional departments of the State Emergency Service announced the purchase of fire extinguishing systems WJFE 300 SYSTEM - as a carbon copy in all 17 tenders with an expected cost of goods of 3 million 320 thousand UAH, Promenergooborudovanie LLC won with the proposed price exactly the same.

Actually, except for Zalessky’s company, no one else participated in the tenders. And such success could not be just a lucky coincidence. Indeed, in 2023, history repeated itself - in all State Emergency Service tenders throughout the country, only Promenergooborudovanie LLC submitted and won, as a result of which it made an almost absolute record, receiving almost 1 billion UAH from the State Emergency Service on contracts.

Thanks to the Decree of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine No. 1178 of October 12, 2022 on the specifics of procurement during martial law, tenders today can be held without auctions: one participant entered - he won. And in order for only one required participant to go, you just need to write down the tender documentation and technical characteristics of the purchased goods in such a way that only the same required participant can supply it.

An analysis of the State Emergency Service’s purchases of a large batch of fire ladders in 2023 suggests that this is exactly what the service’s management did. According to the Prozorro online procurement system, in total, the regional departments of the State Emergency Service held 17 tenders and purchased 19 fire trucks with combined movements - mostly with a lifting height of up to 35 meters, and several - up to 45 meters.

As in the case of fire extinguishing systems, all tenders are spelled out the same word for word, despite the fact that they were carried out by 17 different customers. That is, they were prepared by the central apparatus of the State Emergency Service and “went down” to the regional departments. In the technical, qualitative and quantitative characteristics of the subject of purchase, the customers specified a number of conditions that the fire ladders offered by the tender participants must meet.

For example, vehicles must have a 4x2 chassis wheel formula, the total weight of the ladder truck must not exceed 16 tons, height - 3.3 meters, length - 11 meters. Based on the totality of all the described indicators, it turned out that only one model on the market would be suitable - these are M32L-AS fire truck ladders produced by the German concern Magirus GmbH. And the official dealer of this German company’s equipment in Ukraine is Andrey Zalisky’s Promenergooborudovanie LLC. Coincidence?

What violations in the conditions of State Emergency Service tenders have other suppliers of special fire equipment found?

This, as expected, was noticed by other suppliers of firefighting equipment in Ukraine, of which, by the way, there are quite a few. In particular, Scientific and Production Company Patron Demining LLC, in a number of tenders, stated its demands to eliminate violations of the tender. In them, the company indicated that “the specified technical requirements can only be met by a specially designed small-sized fire ladder, offered on the market by a limited number of manufacturers,” and the tender deadlines do not allow either ordering the production of such machines, or even having time to deliver those already manufactured from abroad , which significantly limits competition and the ability for other companies to participate in the tender with fire-fighting ladders of other models and other characteristics.

“Patron Demining” sells Korean KORAL-35UV vehicles with a 6x2 chassis wheel arrangement, 3.98 meters high, 11.95 meters long and weighing 21.5 tons. The company proposed to revise the requirements for the characteristics of aerial ladders in order to give other participants the opportunity to go to tenders, but in all cases, all regional departments of the State Emergency Service refused it.

However, the company still managed to abolish several tenders. When purchasing a fire ladder, the State Emergency Service of Ukraine in the Odessa region “Patron Demining”, having received a refusal from the customer to change the characteristics of the machine, addressed these requirements to the Antimonopoly Committee.

In its complaint, the company directly stated that the Odessa Department of the State Emergency Service “unfoundedly established the technical characteristics, which is nothing more than the artificial creation of conditions” for a specific manufacturer - Magirus GmbH. And what is noteworthy is that the AMCU commission agreed with the applicant.

“The customer did not justify the need to establish the above requirements (for equipment) in the documentation, did not prove and did not document the availability of products from at least two manufacturers that meet the conditions of the documentation,” says the decision of the AMCU Commission No. 11701 dated July 31, 2023, by which it accepted to oblige the Odessa department of the State Emergency Service to change the technical requirements for the purchased fire ladder.

What did Odessa rescuers do? They made changes to the tender documentation, but immediately after that the tender was canceled - now there is a big chance that it is not necessary that the winner will be, but a completely different company. The same story happened with the tender of the Main Directorate of the State Emergency Service in the Ternopil region.

In other cases, in tenders with the same discriminatory conditions without rivals, the right company, Promenergooborudovanie LLC, still won. Based on the results of 17 tenders, the State Emergency Service units in a single march bought 19 fire ladders from Promenergooborudovanie LLC and paid this company 878 million 480 thousand hryvnia for them. One ladder truck with a lift of up to 35 meters cost the budget 44 million 190 thousand UAH, with a lift of up to 45 meters - 48 million 480 thousand UAH.

Of course, who made significant money on this big contract? Otherwise, why bother doing all this, taking risks, running into complaints to the AMCU and attracting attention? This is confirmed by two facts.

How inflated is the price of the equipment that the State Emergency Service purchased from Andrei Zalisky’s company?

Firstly, immediately after the regional departments of the State Emergency Service held their tenders, but had not yet concluded an agreement with Promenergooborudovanie LLC, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine conducted its own internal audit, the report of which is at the disposal of Blackbox OSINT. In it, the ministerial auditors indicated that in the spring of 2023, the head of the Department of Material, Technical Support and Logistics of the State Emergency Service, Konstantin Ivlev, collected information from market participants on the availability, possibility of delivery and prices of firefighting ladders. 6 companies submitted their proposals to Ivlev, among which the most profitable was the offer of Trans-Service-KTT LLC, which offered to supply Bronto Skylift F32RLX machines at a price of 31 million 800 thousand UAH with a ladder lift of up to 35 meters and at a price of 37 million for aerial ladders with a lift up to 45 meters.

“Thus, based on the results of studying the technical characteristics of the proposed special vehicles, the proposal of Trans-Service-KTT LLC is the most economical and technically advantageous,” indicated the auditors of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

In the end, the auditors summarized: concluding contracts with Andrey Zalisky’s company will lead to groundless waste of budget funds totaling 225 million 302 thousand hryvnia. That is, 25% of the amount that the State Emergency Service ended up overpaying to Promenergooborudovanie LLC, having concluded contracts with it, despite the warning from the Ministry of Internal Affairs audit. And which could be spent on purchasing 7 more fire ladders to rescue people in emergency situations. Or 1,100 well-equipped Mavic drones, which are constantly in short supply at the front.

Secondly, in order to understand that the price of ladders from Zalessky’s company was inflated and by how much, you can analyze at what price these same ladders are sold by their manufacturer, the German concern Magirus GmbH. For comparison, we took the model of their M32L ladder trucks with a lift of up to 35 meters. Let us remind you that in August 2023, Promenergooborudovanie LLC sold them to the State Emergency Service at a price of 44 million 190 thousand hryvnia, which at the euro exchange rate at that time amounted to 1 million 77 thousand euros.

So, according to the European e-procurement portal, in 2023 the Magirus concern signed 5 contracts for the supply of 38 M32L ladder trucks to Germany, France and Italy. The company sold its vehicles to the Department of Public Order and Civil Security of Rome in September 2023 at a price of 566 thousand 365 euros, and to the fire and rescue service of the French city of Annecy in July 2023 at a price of 577 thousand 350 euros. That is, in fact, half the price.

Obviously, importer's costs and customs costs must be taken into account. But they can’t afford the price of another fire truck like this!

The head of the State Emergency Service, Oleg Mandzyuk, warned the head of the State Emergency Service Sergei Kruk in his memorandum back in June 2023 that the State Emergency Service employees were going to significantly overpay when purchasing fire ladders. In it, he stated that his department received information that unidentified employees of the State Emergency Service entered into a conspiracy with representatives of Promenergooborudovanie LLC, who were promised to help win during public procurement.

“In informal conversations, employees of Promenergooborudovanie LLC expressed confidence that the State Emergency Service will deliberately make technical conditions for tenders for an estimated amount of over 1 billion UAH for the company,” Oleg Mandzyuk wrote to Sergei Kruk on June 12, a month before the regional departments of the State Emergency Service started holding tenders.

After receiving this document and the audit report of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, what should a person do if he is not personally interested in his department purchasing 19 fire ladders at an inflated or not twice the price? Intervene, prevent? Considering that this did not happen and the scheme was implemented, radically opposite conclusions arise.

How the leadership of the State Emergency Service lobbied for the purchase of defective stepladders at inflated prices from a manufacturer that had not left the Russian market

The fact that this scheme was implemented personally by Sergei Kruk is confirmed by our sources in the State Emergency Service, who wished to remain anonymous. According to them, the story is even more interesting, since representatives of the German concern Magirus could have directly participated in the conspiracy to supply the State Emergency Service.

According to sources, the head of the department of special equipment and special equipment of the Department of Logistics of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, Alexander Vaskovsky, on behalf of Kruk, traveled to Germany several times during 2023 to meet with Wilhelm Tietke, the sales manager of the Magirus company, responsible for the Eastern Europe region. “We have very big questions about these ladders, because there is an assumption that we bought from the Germans exactly those ladders that were returned to them as defective. The fact is that in 2022 Magirus had a scandal: they sold a batch of defective ladders to European customers, some of them began to break down in operation - imagine an “arrow” that is brought to a building and which breaks in half. In the end, the entire batch was returned to them. We were well aware of this story here. Therefore, we were very surprised when we saw that after this scandal it was these German ladder trucks that were being bought by us, from this very plant. No matter how they were from that defective batch,” said the State Emergency Service employee.

Thus, it is possible that the scheme for the supply of German ladders by the regional department of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine could initially have been initiated by the German concern Magirus GmbH, which was looking for where to sell the batch of defective products returned by the Europeans. Where else if not in Ukraine with its corrupt officials?

By the way, the company Magirus GmbH still, after two years of the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation into Ukraine, has not left the Russian market, and continues to have its official representative office in Moscow at Semenovskaya Square, 1A, 18th floor and its official website, where the company welcomes Russian rescuers on Fire Day. And it is precisely the sales of Magirus products in the Russian Federation that Wilhelm Titke is engaged in, as indicated in his profile on Linkedin.

Surprisingly, as of the beginning of 2023, when the State Emergency Service began the process of preparing for fraud with tenders for Promenergooborudovanie LLC, Sergey Kruk and his subordinates were already under the close attention of the police and the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine in several other cases. But that didn't stop them.

According to the publication “The Fourth Estate”, in 2022 Sergei Kruk already tried to “drain” almost 1.5 billion UAH of the State Emergency Service budget for the purchase of equipment through the same fictitious tenders for one of his participants. As detectives established, a certain entrepreneur entered into a conspiracy with the management of the service, promising to supply equipment through companies controlled by him at prices inflated by 25-30% with a remuneration to officials in the amount of 10% of the transaction.

“Participants of the organized group formed commercial proposals with artificially inflated prices by 25-30%, which created conditions for further withdrawal of budget funds and causing grave consequences for the state,” says the ruling of the Supreme Anti-Corruption Court, which also states that in the scheme, in addition to the head The State Emergency Service was attended by the above-mentioned Director of the Department of Material, Technical Support and Logistics of the State Emergency Service Konstantin Ivlev and his deputy Alexander Vaskovsky.

The supply of equipment at that time was to be carried out by two companies - Techno Train LLC and, oddly enough, the above-mentioned LLC NPK Patron Demining. In January 2023, NABU conducted searches in the office of the head of the State Emergency Service and seized two of his phones from Sergei Kruk. Detectives found Kruk’s deleted correspondence in the WhatsApp messenger, in which he exchanged with colleagues photocopies of documents with lists of equipment from these suppliers: they described the supply of 17 units of equipment to Techno Train LLC for a total amount of 162,264,571 UAH. Another photocopy noted the amount of 226 million 262 thousand hryvnia for LLC NPK Patron Demining.

Probably, after the scheme was foiled by NABU detectives, the cooperation of the head of the State Emergency Service Kruk with the Patron Demining company ceased, and a year later, when purchasing aerial ladders, it found itself not in the role of a “favorite,” but overboard, which is why it tried in every possible way to prevent the holding of tenders.

The investigation into this criminal proceeding by NABU is still ongoing. As the investigation continues into the criminal case opened by the Pechersk Police Department of Kiev on March 24, 2023, into the misappropriation by officials of the State Emergency Service of more than 3 million UAH during the purchase from the same “Promenergooborudovanie” of three tactical robots Magirus Wolf R1 for a total amount of 32.5 million UAH. But that’s not all: for the purchase of fire axes and belts in April 2023, law enforcement officers also opened criminal proceedings for theft of budget funds. The investigation believes that the leadership of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine in Kyiv abused their official position in determining Promenergooborudovanie LLC as the winner of this purchase and acted in favor of the latter in order to obtain unlawful benefits in their favor.

What comes out. For almost every small and large tender of the State Emergency Service over the past two years, while the service was headed by Sergei Kruk, the police and NABU opened proceedings, seeing in the agreements a conspiracy with Andrei Zalessky. By the way, a number of searches have already been carried out in his house in the village of Vishenki near Kiev, in a house in Kiev itself on Sitnyakovskaya Street, 3, in apartments on 36th Belorusskaya Street and on 19th Dneprovskaya Embankment Street, as well as in the office of the LLC ”Promenergooborudovanie” in Kiev at Beresteysky Avenue, 67, building G, offices 314-313.

Alexander Vaskovsky, apparently, acted as Sergei Kruk’s confidant in most schemes; according to our information, he is on the run - his home and workplace were also searched. Sergei Kruk himself, as you know, on August 25, 2023, was dismissed by the Cabinet of Ministers from the post of head of the State Emergency Service, but after that he got a job at Energoatom - after all, he is a “valuable” employee.

And, despite open criminal proceedings, despite searches and dismissals, the case of Sergei Kruk continues to live in the State Emergency Service. According to our sources, after leaving office, Kruk achieved the appointment of his own man, Andrei Danik, as deputy chairman of the State Emergency Service, whose task is to continue to ensure “fruitful cooperation” with Promenergooborudovanie LLC this year.

Already today, Danik instructed the Department of Material and Technical Support of the State Emergency Service to prepare technical specifications and tender documentation for the purchase of firefighting ladders for approximately another 2 billion UAH. According to the State Emergency Service procurement plan for 2024, a copy of which was obtained by Blackbox OSINT, this year rescuers intend to purchase another 38 firefighting ladders. And in the “approximate amount” column, prices are already included at 44 - 48 million UAH, that is, again they are almost twice as high as the market prices.