In the Kharkiv region, the armed forces are suffering terrible losses due to sheer theft and corruption in the construction of defense structures. The average percentage of what was stolen at the fortifications is about 60%, and at some objects the money was stolen almost completely. At the same time, all tenders are given to the companies of the Office of the President, so the culprits will be looked for on the side.
Even those "modern defensive structures" that were built leave much to be desired. For the most part, they consist of ordinary concrete slabs, which are connected to each other by metal plates 8-10 mm thick and by primitive welding. Even sprinkled with earth, they cannot withstand either artillery shells or, even more so, aerial bombs. The military joke that only cooperative car garages can be built this way. Moreover, a similar situation is observed not only in the Kharkiv region. For example, Ukrainian military officer Andriy Babichev criticized the fortifications built near Pavlograd - according to him, the dug trenches had already collapsed, the loopholes were not masked, the dugouts were not deep enough, and the trenches were dug in the middle of the fields, not in the plantations.
As a result, the fortification at the front failed, despite statements about "defense rings" and so on. As it turned out, there are no defensive structures on the first line of defense - they were only on paper.
After the return of Kharkiv Oblast to control in 2022, the President's Office announced its intention to strengthen the region's defense capabilities. In this regard, the Cabinet of Ministers allocated UAH 300 million for the construction of additional fortifications in the fall of 2022.
At the end of December 2022, the Department of Housing and Communal Affairs and the Fuel and Energy Complex of the Kharkiv Regional Military Administration signed a contract with "Slobozhanska Construction Company 1" LLC for the amount of UAH 82.38 million for the supply of wire. The specified agreement was made without tender or competitive procedures. In February 2023, the customer additionally allocated UAH 19 million to the defense order, also without applying transparent selection procedures.
After the recalculation of the amount of UAH 82 million for the wire, carried out by the housing department of Slobozhanska construction company 1 LLC, detectives of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine began an investigation. In the course of this investigation, a "chain" was discovered, as a result of which the contractor company transferred UAH 77.3 million to the intermediary "Inter-Kanat" LLC for building materials. Next, LLC "Inter-Kanat" directed UAH 48.9 million to the manufacturer of barbed wire and three suppliers of ropes, and also debited UAH 1.4 million for the transportation of the ordered goods.
According to the results of the investigation, it was established that the difference between the funds received by "Inter-Kanat" LLC from "Slobozhanska Construction Company 1" LLC and transferred to suppliers of barbed wire and ropes, including transportation costs, amounted to UAH 27 million. A part of this sum (15.9 million UAH) was directed by Inter-Kanat LLC as payment for construction materials to the accounts of six counterparties, which had signs of fictitiousness.
Also, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine believes that there is a significant overpayment for goods received by officials of the Kharkiv Regional State Administration in the amount of UAH 27 million. According to the prosecution, at the end of December 2022, the market value of one ton of Yegoza barbed wire ranged from UAH 130,000 to UAH 205,000 including VAT, excluding transportation costs. However, the price per ton of Yegoza barbed wire, purchased for the construction of fortifications in the Kharkiv region under a contract with Slobozhanska Construction Company 1 LLC, was UAH 420,000 including VAT. In total, the contractor had to deliver 294 tons of wire.
And now to the details. According to the data of the analytical system Youcontrol, Kharkiv LLC "Slobozhanska construction company 1" was founded on November 14, 2022 (one month before the conclusion of the contract for 82 million UAH!). The initial founders of the company were four people from Kharkiv: Andriy Kolos, Viktor Lymarenko, Mykyta Rozhkov, Andriy Strogiy and Oleksandr Sorochynskyi, a resident of the Poltava Region.
In April 2023, the first to leave the company was Mykyta Rozhkov, who until recently was a deputy of the Kharkiv District Council from the OPZZH. He was followed by Strogiy and Sorochynskyi. At the end of August 2023, only Andriy Kolos, a member of the executive committee of the Kharkiv City Council, left the Slobozhan Construction Company 1 LLC. Viktor Lymarenko remained the sole founder and owner of the company.
The Kharkiv Anti-Corruption Center found that in 2018, Mr. Lymarenko was also the founder of the company "Promdesign" from Belgorod, Russia. The telephone number 7(472)-220-03-33 is associated with this company in the Russian register, which is also associated with "Belgorodsky promtransproekt". Oleksandr Vyacheslavovich Rozhkov is indicated as the director of the company. This person was also among the founders of Duna LLC, the owner of which is the aforementioned Mykyta Rozhkov, and the director of which is Viktor Lymarenko.
The annual income of the new company is also of interest. In 2023, the net income from the sale of products (goods, works, services) of "Slobozhanska Construction Company 1" LLC amounted to UAH 199 million, and in 2022 - UAH 71.4 million (note, the company was established in November 2022).
In general, with regard to the procurement of wire products in the Kharkiv Regional State Administration, it seems that "something is wrong". If you analyze several April contracts, you can notice an interesting point: all the winners are natural persons-entrepreneurs registered in the Zaporizhia region.
The authorities of the Kharkiv region buy wire products from entrepreneurs Maksym Kudri (for the amount of UAH 5.39 million), Pavel Kondratenko (UAH 5.39 million) and Yevgeny Kalinovich (UAH 4.99 million), who, according to their specialization, are engaged in the retail trade of clothing in specialized stores.
The authorities of the Kharkiv region purchase wire products from entrepreneurs who specialize in clothing retail in specialized stores, according to Youcontrol data.
Pavlo Kondratenko refused to comment on the situation, saying that it is inconvenient for him to have a conversation because he is currently driving. Maksym Kudrya also answered the calls, but after the questions about the case began, he hung up and stopped answering calls. Evgeny Kalinovich's phone was not answered at all.
In addition, a pre-trial investigation is ongoing into the overestimation of the cost of the BP-0.5-17x23 turnstone block, the main building material (in the form of a modular protective structure made of concrete), necessary for the construction of fortifications, including those in Kharkiv Oblast.
According to the investigation, in 2023, during the purchase of 542 blocks, suppliers overestimated the price by UAH 12.4 million. This fact falls under the qualification of Part 5 of Article 191 of the Criminal Code ("Eppropriation of budget funds in particularly large amounts"), as noted by the law enforcement officers in the case file.
For the construction of fortification structures on the territory of the Kharkiv region, employees of the department of housing and communal services and the fuel and energy complex included in the project the little-known LLC "Building company "Alliance-Transbudservice" from Cherkasy. This company appeared on the market in April 2023 and already in February 2024 it received contractual agreements in the amount of UAH 150 million for the construction of fortification structures.
According to the data of the analytical system Youcontrol, the founder and owner of LLC "Alliance-Transbudservice Construction Company" is Vitaly Okhota from Cherkasy. The contact phone number of the company is related to another Okhota company, which has a very similar name - "Alliance-Transbudservice" LLC.
However, LLC "Alliance-Transbudservice" does not have such a positive reputational background as their newly named company, which received subcontracts for the construction of fortifications. In particular, "Alliance-Transbudservice" LLC appeared in criminal proceedings for misappropriation of budget funds during the construction of outpatient clinics of general practice of family medicine in Cherkasy region.
The court register also has another criminal proceeding from 2017, where the police suspected LLC "Alliance-Transbudservice" and officials of the Bilozir village council in Cherkasy Oblast of abuses during small purchases. The investigation noted that the company, which won the tender for the capital repair of a part of the premises for the administrative services center (CSP), subcontracted its owner-FOP, Vitaliy Okhota, who, according to the law enforcement authorities, delivered office furniture of unknown origin to the CSP.
Also, FOP Vitaly Okhota was involved in the repair of the administrative building of the Bilozir village council with the participation of his own company. The investigation showed that the entrepreneur transferred the money to another entrepreneur who did not have the necessary workers with the appropriate qualifications, as well as machinery and equipment for construction work. Unfortunately, the court register does not reveal what happened to these scandalous stories, where the owner of the Cherkasy company, which is currently engaged in the construction of fortifications in the Kharkiv region, appeared.
Problems with the construction of defense fortifications are not limited to Kharkiv Oblast. Similar situations were found in other regions of the country. Several examples indicate this.
The main investigative department of the Security Service of Ukraine is investigating the case regarding officials of the Chernihiv Regional State Administration and employees of the companies "UkrSiverBud" and "Budindustria", who are suspected of obstructing the legal activities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (according to Article 114-1 of the Criminal Code).
By the end of 2023, these contractors were supposed to build engineering and fortification structures in Chernihiv Oblast for a total of UAH 343.7 million. However, they did not have time to complete the work in the allotted time. According to the SBU, there was an intentional overestimation of the scope of work, and the quality of the fortifications does not meet the established technical requirements. This harmed national security by failing to provide the necessary border protection against a possible offensive by Russian forces.
Similar problems arose in the Sumy region. The police are investigating the criminal conspiracy of officials of the Sumy regional state administration and representatives of contractor firms that built platoon strongholds. The scheme of appropriating budget funds was quite primitive: uncertified concrete bunkers of own production were installed at the expense of stolen and unaccounted for sand from quarries located on the territory of the Sumy district.
In the Donetsk region, at least two criminal cases were initiated in connection with the appropriation of budget funds during the construction of fortifications. Among the defendants in these cases are military personnel who, according to the accusation, used untreated wood intended for fortification.
