Olena Shulyak, Semen Kryvonos and the schemes in construction

The name of the head of the "Servant of the People" party, Olena Shulyak, is like a snowball, accumulating more and more scandals.

Let us recall the loudest and most shameful one that occurred a week ago, when the "servant of the people" Shulyak burst into a military hospital and attacked Oleh Symoroz, who is one of the most consistent critics of the urban planning reform law (Law No. 5665), of which Olena Shulyak is a co-author and lobbyist.

The aggressive representative of the presidential faction was not deterred by the fact that Oleh Symoroz was under anesthesia after an operation to amputate both legs due to severe injury at the front. Symoroz has repeatedly written and spoken about how Law 5665 was adopted in favor of the construction mafia, which apparently angered its co-author.

Oleh Symoroz considers the law, authored by Olena Shulyak, anti-people, and criminal, and believes it could lead to the destruction of historical monuments. The Ukrainian Cities Association, the "Chesno" movement, the Anti-Corruption Action Center, Avtomaidan, DE JURE, the "Nashi Hroshi" program, politicians, public organizations, and the Main Legal Department of the Verkhovna Rada opposed its adoption. However, with a minimal number of votes—228 "for"—this law was adopted on December 13th. Among those who voted for it were the former "OPFL" members, including the notorious Shufrych, a figure on the Register of State Traitors.

After Olena Shulyak’s behavior angered not only the opposition but also faction colleagues, she tried to backtrack, claiming she "came to visit the wounded soldier and inquire about his health." This pathetic excuse would be funny if it weren’t so vile.

But the scandals associated with Shulyak’s name, who has long been closely tied to the construction mafia Symoroz spoke about, have not subsided. A correspondence between the head of the "Servant of the People" party and the head of the State Architectural and Building Control Inspection (SACI) Semen Kryvonos about the same corruption in this area, mentioned by the shocked "care" of Olena Shulyak by the wounded soldier, was quickly leaked online.

It’s hard to see in the picture, but Kryvonos writes to Olena Shulyak: "In addition, these SACI receive ten complaints a day, in writing and with lots of claims that they want 5 to 25 for a square. Yesterday a complainant came to me with a reproach and a complaint. Says why are you cheating people; you have a back office with Lesya from the back end. We brought the permission there, and now you’re peeking at us with architectural control to bring more. It was about the Kyiv SACI in the end. The same was in Kharkiv... All the scoundrels from SACI moved there. I honestly had fun the other day when Mohylnyi inadvertently admitted in a post that we don’t take bribes."

The correspondence is from this year—Semen Kryvonos sent his message to Olena Shulyak in early December 2021, when she just headed the "SN" party.

And it’s about simple things—corruption in the system of permitting authorities that sign the necessary documents for construction permits. The phrase "5 to 25 for a square" is decoded simply: the developer must peel off cash from $5 to $25 per square meter of housing planned for construction.

These amounts were to be delivered to the place called "back office, Lesya from the highlands." Most likely, it refers to the head of the Kyiv organization "Servant of the People" Lesya Zaburanna, who replaced the "fighter of the Transcarpathian territorial defence" Mykola Tyshchenko in this position and frankly serves the interests of the most notorious Kyiv developers—Vavrysh and Mykytas.

And complaints from those who brought money to the "back-office" are complaints from developers who, after shelling out the required amount to the "back-office," suddenly found out that this was not all—they also needed to pay the SACI.

Because precisely during the period when the correspondence between Kryvonos (do not confuse this person with the combat general Kryvonos, who defended Zhuliany and was slapped with a criminal charge by the "servants") took place, a game of musical chairs went on in the architectural and construction control organs, caused by the struggle for control over these very bodies.

In March 2020, the Cabinet liquidated the State Architectural and Building Inspection and created three new bodies: the State Inspection for Urban Development, the State Agency for Technical Regulation in Urban Development, and the State Urban Development Service. However, even with these services, the "servants’" plan to seize full control failed, so they were liquidated, and the State Inspection of Architecture and Urban Development was established, which Kryvonos headed.

The funniest thing in this situation is that Semen Kryvonos, by his first education, is an agronomist, and only later received a legal education, and he does not have a construction one at all.

But this by no means prevents him from successfully managing constructions for himself. At least the following fact is worth something: in April 2016, Kryvonos won the competition for the position of Director of the Odesa Territorial Department of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU). However, he refused this position after a series of publications about doubtful facts from his biography. In particular, it became known that despite modest income, he and his wife managed to become owners of seven and a half hectares of land, a house, and an apartment of 80 squares near Kyiv.

According to journalists’ calculations, at that time such an apartment cost over 3 million UAH. Moreover, he did not declare it. Concerning this, Kryvonos stated that initially, his parents allegedly bought this apartment for him, and then he gave it to his mother as a gift. According to Kryvonos, he became the owner of these hectares of land before entering the civil service.

However, even what Semen, who at that time worked as the first deputy head of the Odesa Customs, included in the declaration is impressive: seven land plots, most of which are on the outskirts of Kyiv. There was also an apartment, for one and a half million hryvnias, registered to his wife, and a house registered to his wife and her father. Which obviously did not tie in with the official income of customs officer Kryvonos.

Concerning his work at customs, at this time the so-called walnut scheme flourished, in which Odesa Regional Governor Saakashvili was involved, one of whose associates was Kryvonos. The smuggling scheme so impressed then-Prime Minister Hroysman that he even instructed the Prosecutor General to eliminate it.

But all this is now history. How Semen Kryvonos works now is more eloquently revealed by the phrase from the quoted correspondence between him and Olena Shulyak: "I honestly had fun the other day when Mohylnyi inadvertently admitted in a post that we don’t take bribes."

If someone did not understand—the head of the state body responsible for building permits and a member of the Ukrainian Parliament, the head of the party that completely controls the legislative and executive power in the country, discuss corruption in the bodies they control. And they joke about it.

And then the head of this party bursts into the ward of a person who lost his legs in battle, defending the country that these people blatantly rob, and causes him a scandal because he dared to criticize the law pushed through by Olena Shulyak, lobbying the interests of the construction mafia.

But the story doesn’t end there. Just three days after the ruckus in the hospital, Olena Shulyak gets into yet another scandal. According to the media, draft law 8202 on amending the law "On Public Procurement" authored by the head of the "Servant of the People" party Olena Shulyak and her seven colleagues was registered in the Verkhovna Rada.

The essence of the draft law: allow state customers to change the significant terms of contracts for the procurement of works and services for current repairs six months after the conclusion of the agreement itself. Namely, allow increasing the price of construction contracts if this increase is documented by an expert organization authorized to conduct a construction project examination according to the law.

The only thing needed to drive prices up under this scheme is an "understandable" expert organization. And such a coincidence—it happens that a week ago the Verkhovna Rada voted for Olena Shulyak’s bill to create new rules for expert organizations. These rules will lead to the establishment of control over the construction market by organizations whose leadership shares patents for expert certification with MP Dmytro Isayenko. This is the same law criticized by Symoroz, after which Olena Shulyak flipped out in his ward.

Against this background, several strokes will be interesting to the portrait of the head of the presidential party, Olena Shulyak.

But the most disgusting against the backdrop of Shulyak bursting into the ward of a legless soldier is the story involving her husband and brother.

Both of them, despite the general mobilization, left the country at the beginning of March. Businessman Seyar Kurshutov reported this on his Facebook, citing his own sources. At the same time, the relatives of the main "servant" took with them 1.3 million dollars in cash, antique icons, and three fur coats. By the way, there have been no denials from Shulyak herself or the State Border Guard Service on this matter.