Developers Molchanova and Antonov want to take over Literary Square in Kyiv

Developers Molchanova and Antonov want to take over Literary Square in Kyiv

The scandal over the alleged partial development of Literary Square (formerly Chkalovsky) has reignited in the capital.

The companies belonging to the orbit of well-known developers Vladyslava Molchanova and Vasyl Antonov (pictured) offered the city community to give a part of the land plot leased for construction to the city for the development of the green zone and to renovate it at their own expense. In this way, the businessmen believe, a compromise should be reached with local residents who oppose the construction of another apartment building in this location.

However, no agreement seems to have been reached with the activists - the latter insist that the square should cover a larger area and that if built, it could actually turn into the adjoining territory of a "future" residential high-rise. Last week, this issue was considered at the plenary session of the Kyiv City Council, but no solution to the problem, which has been going on for almost seven years, was adopted.

As it became known to CV, during the plenary session of the Kyiv City Council held on 30 May 2024, the deputies did not support the draft decision on the division of the plot at 80-B Bohdana Khmelnytskoho Street (No. 08/231-798/PR of 27 June 2023).

It was submitted by Petro Olenych, Deputy Head of the Kyiv City State Administration (KCSA) for Self-Government, and the Department of Land Resources of the KCSA. In the session hall, only 39 MPs voted for the approval of this document as a basis (the required minimum is 61 MPs).

What is planned to be done

The land in question is a 0.048-hectare plot leased from the Kyiv community by Obolon Youth Housing Complex LLC under an agreement with the Kyiv City Council dated 23 March 2005 (its former cadastral number is 8000000000:88:055:0030, with the intended purpose being "for the construction of a residential building with a car park"). At the same time, since November 2018, this land has been subleased to Delivest LLC.

Thus, back in 2020, at the request of Obolon, a land surveying organisation developed technical documentation for the division of the said land into two plots - 0.031 hectares (cadastral number - 8000000000:88:055:0666) and 0.017 hectares (cadastral number - 8000000000:88:055:0888). Obolon plans to keep most of the land for its own use and return the rest to the community of Kyiv. In addition, the company also leases another plot of land, which it received from the Kyiv City Council under the same agreement, with an area of 0.185 hectares (cadastral number: 8000000000:88:055:0004).

Aerial photographs of this land

In the future, according to the draft decision, the city authorities plan to transfer a part of the aforementioned 0.017 hectare plot to the Kyivzelenbud utility company (UC) for the maintenance and operation of the nearby Literary Square. It is envisaged that for this purpose, the said ME should develop a land management project for the allocation of this land with a change in its designated purpose. In addition, the same draft decision plans to instruct Kyivzelenbud to develop the same project for the plot under the Literary Square itself - an area of 0.79 hectares (it seems that this land has not yet been properly registered - KV).

Interestingly, the document states that the cadastral number of the land under the square is 8000000000:88:055:0057. But at the same time, the CV was unable to find the land under this number on the official cadastral map. In turn, the cadastral number of the land on which the Literary Square is located is 8000000000:88:055:0009.

As noted in the explanatory note to the draft decision, the 0.031-hectare part of the land that Obolon is going to "keep" is undeveloped, and the part of the land that is planned to be used for the arrangement of the Literary Square contains a part of the building - the gardener’s house (its owner is the territorial community of the capital, assigned to the right of economic management to the ME for the maintenance of green spaces (UZN) of the Shevchenkivskyi district). According to the General Plan of Kyiv, the functional purpose of all this land is residential multi-storey development (with the clarification that these are "promising", i.e., not yet built-up areas).

Points for and against"

The issue of dividing the plot at 80-B Bohdana Khmelnytskoho Street was discussed quite actively in the session hall. This initiative has both supporters and critics.

For example, Oleksandr Berezhnyi, a representative of Obolon Residential Construction Company, once again denied that the company would encroach on the territory of Literaturnyi Square when building this area. He also told the deputies that the subtenant of this land intends to arrange this green area at its own expense.

"Obolon has a co-investor in this project - Delivest. It approached the city authorities about becoming an investor in the reconstruction of the park, fully financing it. This proposal was passed by the investment commission at the Kyiv City State Administration, accepted and approved. There is an order from the KCSA to reconstruct the park, and the reconstruction project has been approved. Funding and reconstruction are planned for the current and 2025 years. There is no [our] interference in the green zone. I think that everyone is interested in this project being implemented and the surrounding area being landscaped. And the territory of the park itself will be put in order by the investor without any budgetary investments," said Oleksandr Berezhnyi.

This idea was also supported by Halyna Plachinda, a resident of the nearby house on Olesнa Halyna Street, a well-known journalist, writer and former activist who fought against the construction of the Literary Square. At the same time, she accused the "saviours" of this park, who, according to her, sometimes do not even know where it is, of making it impossible to transfer the land plot to Kyivzelenbud. At the same time, Plachinda stressed that she does not know who benefits from disrupting the vote and "hanging this situation".

"In August 2020, I stood on the rostrum of the Kyiv City Council and spoke about the real threat of building up our park. The publicity of this story had a result - representatives of the developer met with me and told me that they were giving the land plot we were fighting for to the city. They also promised that their company would reconstruct the park and finally repair the long-standing Termena fountain," Halyna Plachinda emphasised.

She was opposed by another writer and civic activist Kateryna Zarembo. During her speech, she demanded that Kyivzelenbud should be given the entire plot, which the KCSA officials propose to divide at the tenant’s initiative. Kateryna Zarembo also suggested that MPs create a working group on this issue with the involvement of public activists, and only then make a specific decision on this land. At the same time, she stressed that Halyna Plachinda is not an active activist and does not represent the interests of the community, which includes about 2,000 people (the same number of people signed petitions to the city authorities regarding this situation).

"I ask you not to vote for the draft decision in this version. Transferring the land plot to the balance sheet of Kyivzelenbud is the right decision. But at the same time, the division of the plot, as mentioned by the developer’s representative, makes it possible to illegally build a high-rise building within the triangle of Kotsiubynskoho, Honchara, and Bohdan Khmelnytskoho streets. In this situation, the square is turned into a house adjoining territory. This is a construction with consequences of CC3, i.e. the highest level of danger (currently, there is no information in open sources on the issuance of a construction permit, which officially indicates the class of consequences - KV). The construction is located on the territory of the architectural monument of the Institute of Geology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, close to the park. And it cannot be carried out without affecting the park and damaging neighbouring buildings, which has already happened during previous attempts to carry out construction," said Kateryna Zarembo.

These demands of this part of the public were supported by some members of the Kyiv City Council, in particular, representatives of the European Solidarity faction, Dinara Gabibulayeva and Victoria Ptashnyk. They pointed out, among other things, that such high-profile issues cannot be brought to the session hall without prior consultation with those activists who are dissatisfied with the potential development of the area. Gabibulayeva also used as an argument the fact that the well-known Ukrainian writer Lina Kostenko, who lives in the house next door and was recently awarded the title of "Honorary Citizen of Kyiv" by the Kyiv City Council, wrote a letter to protect Literary Square (to whom exactly, it was not specified - ed.).

As a result, as mentioned above, the city council was unable to approve this draft decision even as a basis. Therefore, for the time being, the approval of this document is at least postponed, and at most, this initiative will be put to rest. And then the developer will have the entire plot leased for the construction of a residential high-rise building with a car park.

Background and context

On 15 July 2004, the Kyiv City Council, by its decision No. 419/1829, approved the transfer of two land plots with a total area of 0.3 hectares (0.23 hectares and 0.07 hectares respectively) at 80-B Bohdana Khmelnytskoho Street to Obolon Municipal Housing Company CJSC (the company’s legal form at the time) for a 3-year lease. As noted above, on 23 March 2005, the Kyiv City Council and Obolon entered into a lease agreement for this land.

Subsequently, this agreement was extended several times, including in court. In particular, on 14 May 2008, it was renewed for the same term in accordance with the decision of the Kyiv Commercial Court of 31 March of the same year - the company appealed to the judges because the Kyiv City Council "did not want to voluntarily extend the agreement". The agreement was last renewed pursuant to the decision of the Kyiv Commercial Court of 9 December 2020 (upheld on appeal and cassation). Back then, Obolon Residential Construction Company LLC initiated a legal dispute because the day before, on 2 July 2020, the Kyiv City Council Commission on Urban Development, Architecture and Land Use decided to refuse to renew the lease agreement due to the public outcry over the planned development of the land.

Interestingly, during the first renewal, the aforementioned 0.07-hectare plot "disappeared" from the lease agreement, and as part of the 2017 extension, it was already known that the 0.23-hectare plot had been divided into the two aforementioned 0.185-hectare and 0.048-hectare plots (it is this latter plot that Obolon is now proposing to "divide" again - KV).

Scandals around the development of this land began around 2017. Thus, the local community accused the land users of this site of trying to "eat" the Chkalov Square (now called Literary Square), which has existed since approximately 1925. In particular, the activists pointed out that this park is home to one of the five remaining original large fountains cast in the early 20th century at the factory of the famous Kyiv industrialist Oleksiy Termen. In turn, the persons whom the media called "representatives of the developer" stated in December 2021 that they had no intention of building the park and guaranteed to restore its landscaping. They also promised to give up part of the plot (about 2 hectares) in favour of the park.

One of the activists’ protests (photo from the “Stop Illegal Development” group on Facebook)

Against the backdrop of these disputes, Olha Balytska, a deputy of the Kyiv City Council of the previous VIII convocation (elected from Samopomich), registered two draft decisions in 2019-2020 to "expel" Obolon LLC from the plot at 80-B Bohdana Khmelnytskoho Street. The first draft decision provided for the termination of the relevant lease agreement, and the second one refused to renew the agreement. As a result, the first document was approved by the Kyiv City Council at its meeting on 23 July 2020 in the first reading, but in the end, this draft decision was not approved as a whole, and the second draft decision was "put in a long drawer".

Literary square with Theremin fountain in 2020 (photo from the “Stop illegal development” group on Facebook)

One of the reasons for the land lease agreement to be terminated by the developers was the public’s disagreement with the fact that this territory could be built up. In addition, the deputy pointed out that Obolon had no right to sublease the land, as it required the approval of the Kyiv City Council, which in this case allegedly did not exist.

At the same time, the planned development of the plot at 80-B Bohdana Khmelnytskoho Street should be considered in the context of the development of the neighbouring land - a plot at 55-B Olesia Honchara Street with an area of 0.32 hectares, which has been leased from the capital’s community by the aforementioned Delivest LLC since the early 2000s (cadastral number - 8000000000:88:055:0011). The fact that the same persons are involved in the development of this entire territory is also evidenced, in particular, by the fact that back in 2017, the Main Department of the State GeoCadastre in Kyiv Oblast recorded a common construction fence for these plots (this fact is mentioned in the draft decisions authored by Balytska - KV).

As reported by KV, officially, the construction at 55-B Olesya Honchara Street is carried out on the basis of an agreement between Dilayvest LLC and the Institute of Geological Sciences of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (NAS), concluded in 2003. According to the 2021 building permit, a 12-storey mixed-use complex with 38 apartments can be built there. The implementation of this project is also taking place against the backdrop of constant "showdowns and disputes".

For example, in March 2017, the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine found that construction on this territory was being carried out in violation of Ukrainian legislation on the protection of cultural heritage, and in August 2021, the Department of Cultural Heritage Protection of the Kyiv City State Administration issued an order to provide a number of documents on the work on the land. At that time, officials of the Kyiv City Hall found out that the developers had not received approval for the work from the said department - despite the fact that the construction site is located in the Central Historic Area of Kyiv and is home to a local urban planning and architecture monument, the House of the Kyiv Branch of the Russian Technical Society, 1911-1914 (55-B Olesya Honchara Street).

However, the Institute of Geological Sciences of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine was able to challenge the conclusions of the officials of the relevant ministry and department of the KCSA in court, and therefore, apparently, nothing can prevent the developers from implementing their plans.

Beneficiaries of the development

According to the Youcontrol analytical system, Obolon Residential Complex LLC (the lessee of the land on Bohdana Khmelnytskoho Street) was founded in Kyiv in January 1997. The head of the company is Oleksandr Antonov. Eight residents of the capital of Ukraine are listed as founders of this LLC: Zinaida Alubina, Viktor Sobol, Yevheniya Kachkalda, Halyna Hladyshko, Olena Kardash, Daria Verbiy, Serhiy Didenko and Vasyl Antonov. It is noteworthy that almost all of these people, except for Vasyl Antonov, are registered in the same apartment building on Volodymyr Ivasiuk Avenue (formerly known as Heroiv Stalingrada Avenue) in the Obolon district of the capital.

The said LLC is de facto a part of the construction holding Obolon Residential Complex of the same name. The director of this holding, according to its official website, is the aforementioned Oleksandr Antonov. His brother, Vasyl Antonov, is one of the founders of Obolon MZhK LLC and is also a well-known personality: in 1998-2006 he was a deputy of the Obolon District Council in Kyiv, in 2010-2014 he headed the Obolon District State Administration in Kyiv, and from the moment of its foundation until 2010 he was the CEO of the said construction holding.

Capital-based Delivest LLC (a sublessee of the Bohdana Khmelnytskoho Street site and a lessee of the Olesia Honchara Street site) was registered in February 2005. The head of this company is Iryna Zubenko, the founder is the Cypriot company Sparenton Limited, and the ultimate beneficiary is Yuliya Kharchenko from Kyiv.

As reported by KV, Kharchenko at various times was a co-owner of several companies belonging to the BT Invest group, whose key persons are Lithuanian citizens Raimondas Tumenas, Maryna Poznyakova and Ahne Ruzhiene. This group, among other things, operates the Novus retail chain and implements projects of the Stolitsa Group, a construction developer co-founded by the odious Vlada Molchanova. Earlier, various sources called her a key financial donor to the Kyiv office of the Batkivshchyna party.

Molchanova is one of the largest developers in the capital. Thus, companies from her orbit are actively and scandalously developing hundreds of hectares of Kyiv land, in particular, plots of the former Pushcha-Vodytsia state farm in Podil and Obolon districts of the capital, where a number of residential complexes of the same name are being built. In addition, it is business entities from the Stolitsa Group’s orbit that are also engaged in the completion of residential complexes of the bankrupt Arkada bank. At the same time, despite the constant claims to Molchanova’s construction sites by public activists, law enforcement agencies and various government agencies, the Kyiv city authorities almost annually resolve land and urban planning issues in favour of these companies.

For example, in 2022-2023, the Kyiv City Council approved the DPT for the Minsky massif and part of the Voskresensky industrial area, which were apparently developed in the interests of Molchanova’s companies. In this way, developers will actually be able to continue building their residential high-rise buildings, ignoring a number of state regulations. When discussing the drafts of these DPTs in the session hall of the Kyiv City Council, deputies pointed out that as a result of the development of these territories, their residents would face deepening transport problems and a shortage of social infrastructure.

It should be noted that the Department of Land Resources of the KCSA has been headed by Valentyna Pelykh since 29 June 2021 (she had been acting head of this structure since 2 April 2021). From 27 July 2018 to 1 April 2021, this department was headed by the aforementioned Petro Olenych, who has been Deputy Head of the KCSA since 2 April 2021 and is in charge of land and urban planning issues in Kyiv.

Ivan Kulyk

kyivvlada.com.ua