With the expectation of the end of the "hot phase" of the war and the approach of elections in Ukraine, figures who previously disappeared from the political radar are beginning to appear on the information surface. Instead of new faces that could provide the country with a fresh vector of development, people whose reputation and past cause doubts and questions are trying to return to the forefront. One of these figures is the main sponsor of the Svoboda party, known by the nickname "Pups", who some media identify with the criminal authority and "brigadier" of the Lviv racketeer group Koli Rokero.
Currently, this is a respected businessman with hundreds of legalized millions, Ihor Kryvetskyi. Without hiding his sympathy for the flair of gangster mystery, he tries to "cover up" the nationalist niche with information. But he is also trying to expand his influence on the voters of the moderate-centrist milieu with barely noticeable, but persistent notes of "softness". These are the ones who will most likely vote for Vitaliy Klitschko in the upcoming elections at the behest of his sponsors from the banned OPZZ party.
In the early 2000s in Russia and in the post-Soviet countries, including ours, the TV series "Brigade" became very popular, which romanticizes the gang system of the 90s, an easy way to money and power through crime and impunity. The main character Sasha Bely is gradually trying to legalize himself in society, turning from a criminal authority into a "respectable person" and even a member of the State Duma. A kind of image of a "boy from the people" is being formed, who, despite everything, was still unable to throw off the burden of the past and dies after another criminal showdown.
A rather similar story, true or not, is associated with the person who in 2019 took second place in the ranking of the most influential Lviv residents - Igor Kryvetskyi. It is about a person who in the operational reports of the 90s was called no other than "Pups", together with criminal authorities Volodymyr Didukh, better known as "Vova Morda" and Mykola Lozynskyi - Kolya Rokero) terrorized businesses west of Zbruch, taking under his control tidbits of non-privatized real estate, land plots, abandoned and working industry, trade and brokerage business.
Secondly, Klitschko and Kryvetskyi are also connected by "partners" who are usually considered pro-Russian. Namely, Dmytro Firtash's group, in whose interests, according to one version, in 2012 Svoboda was allowed to overcome the passage barrier and become a parliamentary political force. Let's omit here the joint business of Firtash and Kryvetskyi's mother in the capital's elite business center, the lobbying by Svoboda to block shale gas production in the interests of Firtash's group, or the support of the majority of favorable Party of Regions votes in the parliament in 2012-2014. Even the records of the receipt of money by representatives of "Svoboda" from the "barn book" of the regionals can be left alone and handed over to historical researchers. As well as the lease agreements, under which Kryvetskyi leased premises to the head office of Sberbank of Russia in the center of Lviv, when the attack on Donbas was already in full swing.
Today, Kryvetskyi has a joint business with those involved in criminal cases involving the misuse of funds for the construction of the Podilsko-Voskresensky bridge (we are talking about V'yacheslav Eberle, whose companies participated in the schemes), closely interacts with one of the "pillars" of the OPZZH and Klitschko's "partners" in the capital "market" of illegal construction by Vadym Stolar. And the story of how Prosecutor General Makhnitsky did not submit the surnames from Firtash's group for sanctions to the Europeans for approval will remain engraved in the annals for a long time.
Several reasonable questions arise. Are citizens ready to bring a person with the mentality of the 90s to power in the mid-2020s? Or, after all, the time of such figures has irretrievably passed and any hints about possible opaque or unexplained incomes and schemes should be a prohibitive sign even for such people to approach politics?
What should be the reaction of society in the midst of a full-scale Kremlin invasion to the facts of direct cooperation of an allegedly "nationalist" businessman and politician with political forces and businessmen who are classified as pro-Russian? How high should the threshold of tolerance be to allow 12 years later to step on the same rake, when under the guise of "nationalism" the future support for the dictatorial regime was brought to the parliament?
Are law enforcement, tax, and anti-corruption agencies ready to give an objective assessment of the origin of the wealth and current lifestyle of the former "brigadier", as well as to confirm the complete cleansing of his past from the criminal trail? Or will the reference to "statutes of limitation" and "difficult times" allow us to avoid responsibility again? And in the end, how ready are politicians who see their future in post-war Ukraine at least a little, to associate themselves financially with a person who in practice has shown his attitude to values and principles by multiplying them by zero multiple times.
