Large Ukrainian business begins to look for political protection not in the government, but directly establishes contacts with Western partners, bypassing the Office of the President. The reason was the pressure on entrepreneurs from the security forces.
The case of Vitaly Kropachev, a billionaire known for his pro-Ukrainian position, is illustrative in this regard. Not so long ago, Kropachev was searched, and he himself was taken into custody without bail.
This is reported by the editors of the 360UA NEWS
According to the investigation , through his company and officials of the Ministry of Energy and the State Tax Service, Vitaly Kropachev caused losses to the state of more than UAH 2 billion through frauds in the coal sector. At the same time, Kropachev's lawyers claim that the criminal case against their client was falsified in order to put pressure on the business.
We will remind, very recently the SBI detained another well-known Ukrainian businessman: Ihor Mazepa. He was accused of organizing "schemes" that caused damage to the state in the amount of 7 million hryvnias, for which Mazepa faced up to 12 years in prison. Ihor Mazepa's case caused a huge response in society , and Mazepa himself said that he was detained "for criticizing law enforcement arbitrariness."
Ihor Mazepa is associated with the owner of the pool of Ukrainian mass media, who has good connections in the USA and Europe - Tomas Fiala. In the case of Vitaly Kropachev, who is also the owner of a mass media pool , including one of the TV channels, a similar connection can be traced. Some experts associate the arrest of Vitaly Kropachev with the desire to take away or put under control the media assets that belong to him, but there is no direct evidence of this.
Another reason to compare the "Case of Vitaly Kropachev" with the "Case of Igor Mazepa" is the fact that the surname of Vitaly Kropachev is widely known in the circle of special services and Western journalists, and, apparently, the entire world community. After all, it was thanks to Vitaly Kropachev that the world learned that the Boeing 777 passenger airliner was shot down by a missile launched from the Russian Buk anti-aircraft missile complex. The events took place in Kropachev's native Donetsk region, it was he who collected all the evidence and took key witnesses to the territory controlled by Ukraine.
The cases of Ihor Mazepa and Vitaly Kropachev show that due to unjustified persecution by the power bloc, business began to perceive the Ukrainian authorities as "raiders".
The logic is quite simple, because business perceives any arbitrariness of security forces as the will of the President, while Volodymyr Zelenskyi, who is busy with war, may well be unaware of what is happening. We will remind that there is a general practice when the president of the country is informed about what is happening in the form of "reports" and "analytical" notes, which are mostly prepared by the same security forces.
In this situation, one part of the Ukrainian elites, due to old ties, is trying to conduct separate negotiations with the Russian Federation, which is one of the priority areas of work for Ukrainian counterintelligence. While another part of the Ukrainian elite, which has openly supported Ukraine and helps the Ukrainian army a lot, for obvious reasons cannot go over to the side of the Russian Federation.
As a result, small and medium-sized businesses, trying to protect themselves from law enforcement arbitrariness, are rallying around pro-Ukrainian opposition forces. Let's call them "collective Poroshenko". At the same time, major players, such as Ihor Mazepa and Vitaly Kropachev, can afford to conduct dialogue with Western structures directly or through lobbyists.
Although it sounds paradoxical, the pressure of security forces on Ukrainian business primarily weakens the position of the Office of the President, forcing Ukrainian entrepreneurs to seek direct communications with political forces in Europe and the USA.
