Krasnodar princes – one of the most successful corrupt officials in...

Those who steal from private individuals spend their lives in stocks and chains; those who steal from the public treasure go dressed in gold and purple.
Cato The Elder

Only in Russia can a criminologist define a corrupt official as "a good worker with a patriotic attitude to his country". The most interesting thing is that this definition by Mr. Professor easily gets along with the statement that corruption "spoils" the relationship between the rich and the poor.* Behind the euphemism "spoils" is a more precise definition of "provokes the growth of discontent, which turns into a social explosion", when more than 50% of the population is below the poverty line.

One of the reasons that forms confrontation is the very ideology of the rich, many of whom absolutely agree that "poverty is a personal choice of everyone", as stated by Mr. Bakov, a businessman and former State Duma Deputy, and thus clearly define themselves, comparing the society with the jungle, where the strongest survive, leaving a minimum for the weakest to survive.** In the Scandinavian countries that are closest to the realization of the ideas of freedom, equality, brotherhood and concurrently have one of the highest GDP and the lowest corruption rating in the world; voicing such ideas is simply impossible. Let’s lay it down as an axiom that: recognizing the difference in income by 30 or more times as normal in the society in which a person lives means not only automatic acceptance of corruption, but also implies that the person is actively involved in it.

It is corruption and misappropriation of the country's natural resources, rather than honest business, that forms the super wealthy class. The alternative is to rob residents of other countries, but Russia; unlike the United States, England, France, etc., in the 20th and 21st century; has not done particularly well in this, so getting into the class of nouveaux riches with a 99% probability marks a corrupt official.

Corruption does not start from the bottom, the tone is set by the federal center and Kremlin. Then there are the governors and the teams they form. It is interesting to see how the goals of governors affect forms of corruption. For example, Krasnodar Krai, the government of Tkachov, and then Kondratyev.

The main breadbasket and health resort of Russia has always been famous for its corruption. "The Russian law is currently poorly observed in Russia, and the Krasnodar region is really one of the examples where it is not fully observed" - a very delicate assessment of a member of “Memorial” society, Svetlana Gannushkina.
The family of the former Governor, Mr. Tkachov, continues to be the richest in the Krasnodar region and is one of the 500 richest families in Russia. One of the largest ski resorts in Sochi — Gorky Gorod is estimated at 35 billion rubles and belongs to the daughter and son-in-law of the former Governor. They own the gaming zone "Azov-city", the territory of 2000 hectares and all real estate. The family invested more than 3.5 billion rubles. Building the first gaming zone in Russia through dad’s money was successful, but there was a problem with effective management in the family – they went bankrupt, without working even for three years. Dad helped for the second time- he did not allow the recovery of 2 billion rubles of debt to the Ministry of Finance and the Department of property relations of Krasnodar Krai. They shut down all the matters with those who they still owe about 2 billion rubles as well. You are familiar with the format: "To whom I owe – I forgive my debts". And they moved the new game zone to the Gorky Gorod resort, this time having already invested more – 4 billion rubles. The former Olympic media center, built by the Tkachov family with budget money, was converted into an establishment. Isn't it a beautiful combination?

JSC “Agrocomplex” Company named After N.I. Tkachov, owned by the family – is more than 40 enterprises of different profiles: rice farming, meat and dairy cattle breeding, crop production, pig and poultry farming, processing industry and trade. Over 10 years,Agrocomplex has grown from 150 thousand to 600 thousand hectares, the number of employees has grown almost 6 times to 37,000 employees. Business turnover in 2015 amounted to 38.7 billion rubles.

Today, the Tkachovs' land is about 10% of the total area of the region's farmland. For comparison, the area of Spain is just over 400 thousand hectares. The cost of a hectare of land in Krasnodar Krai is one of the highest and reaches more than 100 thousand rubles. That is, the family owns 60 billion rubles of only one land without the accompanying assets.

The governor's family owns at least a third of the sugar market due to ownership of “Tambov Sugar Company” (RUS Тамбовская Сахарная Компания; Tamboskaya Sakharnaya Kompaniya) factory, the Pavlovsky, Tikhoretsky, and "Kristall” factories.

The personal possessions of the Tkachovs reach almost 200 thousand hectares of land – the territory of the personal residence, plots on the coast of the Black sea, hunting farms, plots in Krasnodar and in the region. At their disposal, they have key manufacturing companies engaged in the construction of houses and roads, dealers of agricultural and construction equipment. Well, and wine, wine of course. A modest factory "Chateau de Talu", owned by his wife, with its own vineyards on 200 hectares and a factory for 1.5 million bottles and about 500 million rubles of annual turnover is about to start supplying Kuban wine to federal networks.

The daughter of the ex-Governor and the son– in-law got the most delicious- construction companies, a resort and part of an agricultural holding. The niece was not offended either. The daughter of the State Duma Deputy Alexey Tkachev, Anastasia Krattli, when she was a student, received plots in the Dinsky district of Kuban in 2007, and then sold them for a total of 21.5 million rubles. And they say that there are no miracles. You just need to write the right letters to Ded Moroz (Santa Claus) in Ustyug. The luck continued: by the end of her studies Anastasia became a co-owner of two pipe plants in Kuban, a large development company and a livestock group of companies "Yugptitseprom". In the civil war, it happened that twenty-year-olds commanded regiments, but they proved their right to do so, risking their lives every day and performing combat tasks at any cost. The only achievement of the niece of the ex-Governor is that she chose a successful family to be born into. It is obvious to everyone that if a person receives such "birthday gifts" without having worked a single day before, it is obvious that this practice is hiding income and covering up raider seizures.

Fate still does not leave Anastasia without a piece of bread. At the wedding, the young woman received a gift of another 30% of the shares of the Krasnodar construction company LLC "Masterstroy", and later became the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the main asset - Agrocomplex. Apparently, the daughter of the governor couldn’t cut even the position of "figurehead". But these are flowers, all the berries went to her husband Kirill Krattli. Well, the husband of such a high-ranking lady can't sell socks in Saratov. Oh, sorry, repair vehicles in a small office, that’s why as a wedding gift at the age of 24, he received one of the largest Russian businesses for the supply of agricultural machinery, which is hidden behind the modest signs of “MirTeh-Kuban” LLC and “Agropraim” LLC.

"Talents should be helped, mediocrities will break through themselves". If only every young person could have this kind of support as Mr. Krattli. The bride's relatives decided that since the young man understands technology – he needs a big dimension. So let him trade in agricultural and construction equipment, and we have connections, we will help him with the promotion and winning of tenders. So Mr. Krattli successfully owns a dealer-company of "the best agricultural machinery from Europe", or rather, signs and maintains contracts that are brought to him "on the beak" by high-ranking relatives.

The last "modest achievements" of the Krattli family- Anastasia receives 50% of “Delta” LLC, which first won tenders for the construction of roads and facilities in Krasnodar Krai for 3 billion rubles, and then mastered contracts for the construction of several Olympic facilities, a media center and a track for Formula 1- already for several tens of billions of dollars.

And well, the mother of the prominent businessman, Ms. Krattli once "rose slightly" at one point, and became the owner of her own resort in Montenegro. 7 villas with “turnkey” infrastructure and land plots with a total area of 8.8 thousand square meters in the resort village of Dobra Voda. The total value of the property is 6 million euros.

The Tkachev-Krattli family is a passed pawn, which a dexterous and skilled player leads to queens on a chess field. The grandmaster, State Duma Deputy from "United Russia" Alexey Tkachev from year to year continues to declare income of 4 million rubles.

Amid all the above, it’s even a bit awkward to remember about the yacht Destini, valued at $25 million; about the purchase of the helicopter for €11 million through the budget, it carried and continues to carry the ex-Governor to his assets, the residence of Tkachov with mansions, apartments and plots in Krasnodar, which today are estimated at around 600 million rubles.

The main strength of the Tkachov mafia was not only in current assets, but also in connections and lobbying potential. It was the "won" tenders that gave the wealth that put the family in the TOP 500 rich people of Russia. Immediately after the ex-Governor's departure, the team that remained was cleaned up by the new Governor, Veniamin Kondratyev in less than two years. And thus very much "not bluffing" - he closed access to part of the tenders. And also prevented Tkachov from carrying out the scam of the decade, at least for Krasnodar Krai: to purchase land for a Golf club for 200 million rubles and then resell it for 1.7 billion rubles to JSC "Krayinvestbank", where the governor was "absolutely accidentally” the majority owner until 2007

Based on the fact that the new governor started blocking Tkachov's initiatives, should Mr.Kondratyev be considered a champion of justice and law and order? No, he just transferred the cash flows from the tenders to himself.

Mr. Kondratyev made the first step in 2016, when the regional budget initially lost 200 million rubles for the construction of a perinatal center in Sochi, and then a "Kuban Construction Company" that won tender went bankrupt, it was allocated the first tranche of 1.6 billion rubles. The money was put in Kuban Universal Bank whose license was revoked by the Central Bank at the end of October 2016. The main shareholder of the bank was the administration of Krasnodar. The bank worked with the regional authorities for 6 years. And suddenly the Central Bank during an audit finds out that KUB put "money in low-quality assets, reserves for losses were not created", there is a "hole" in the balance sheet in the amount of 652 million rubles, and the management and owners of the bank are absolutely passive and do nothing. Why, if all this time they were withdrawing funds from government official-partners. As a result, the work on the perinatal center was stopped before it even started.

"Pay-offs" in the road sector increased by 2 times! The best contracts went to companies that are supervised by the Vice Governor Anatoliy Voronovskii. Within two years, the cost of installing automated weight and dimensional control points on roads had increased. During Tkachov’s administration, they were built by "DorMetallProekt" for 3.4 million rubles. And under Kondratyev – the same company, but for 7 million rubles. The construction project in the region was estimated at 57 million rubles. A company "DorMetall", affiliated with "DorMetallProekt", received the job.

Krasnodar Krai is constantly shaken by land scandals- the seizure of hunting grounds and illegal land redistribution. The governor clearly covers the Minister of natural resources of the region, Sergey Eremin. Municipal land is quietly transferred to private hands for VIP hunting, land redistribution takes place with the tacit consent of the "top". The Krasnodar regional public organization of hunters and fishermen no longer has any land assigned by law, but the governor ignores the Association's complaints. It is not surprising, after all, the cost of one acre in the reserve is approaching 200 thousand rubles.

Raider seizure of “Safari Park” zoo on Solnechny Ostrov (Sunny island) in Krasnodar. 9 hectares of land, one of the best parks in the city. In a few days, the "Safari Park" was visited by the prosecutor's office, tax, labor inspection, veterinary department, Rosprirodnadzor (Federal Service for Supervision of Natural Resources), Ministry of Natural Resources, Department for Combating Economic Crimes and even the FSB- "Region Online" reported. An absolutely simple decision- crushing the park with inspections and fines in order to "convince" the owners to give up their park at a price that will suit the buyer.

The governor has a strange attitude to corruption. In 2015, Mr. Kondratyev went to power with the slogan: "Corruption stifles- choose a government that works."

In 2017, Krasnodar Krai took the 4th place in the ranking of corrupt regions of Russia. The average amount of a bribe reached 1.5 million rubles. The following year, Krasnodar entered the top 10 most corrupt cities in the Russian Federation. And the head of the region, despite the mass “incarceration” explains that there is no corruption, just some officials do not have knowledge of specific issues. In a word, "we are all only human – we make mistakes".

It is necessary to take care of oneself too – Mr. Kondratyev receives land and builds a "noble nest" in the village of Dinskaya near the residence of the former governor. The plot size is more than 45 hectares. 7 houses, fountains, swimming pools, rotundas and tennis courts.

Mr. Kondratyev is concerned about his PR and helicopter fleet. In 2017, as much as 53.8 million rubles were allocated for the promotion of his lovely self ("informing the population about the activities of authorities"), about 300 million rubles were allocated for the replenishment of the helicopter fleet, and 1 billion rubles were allocated for Cossack associations. Meanwhile, Mr. Kondratyev proposed to cancel the benefits for public transport for pensioners in the amount of 100 million rubles, citing the fact that it is necessary to economize the budget

Vladimir Putin's message in 2015 stated that " Russia has no right to be vulnerable. We need to be strong in economy, in technology, in professional competencies, and make full use of today's opportunities, which may not exist tomorrow"

I wonder if the Tkachov family, which owns a territory twice the size of Spain and has assets equal to the Chechen budget – is really the best candidate for their management. They didn't get their assets by a miracle or by any fair means. They do not know how to create assets, earn money, they only know how to consume the "taken".

Or, perhaps, the new governor, Mr. Kondratyev, under whom the region's debts amount to 43.5 billion rubles, municipal lands with high value are transferred to private owners, billions of rubles from the budget disappear into the pockets of "distributors", and government officials are trying to grab the remaining interesting businesses for the boss for next to nothing?

And what "opportunities" did they create? During the period of their work, corruption literally ate up the future of the region and its potential, without giving an increase either in technology or in the professional competencies of its residents. Residents of the region say that today corruption is "the main sphere of the economy". And tomorrow, which has already come, does not bode well for ordinary citizens, because due to corruption, everything that can be "shared" will be "shared", everything that can be stolen will be stolen, and the poorest class will become even poorer and more unprotected.

Hive account@animor aka golos.io/@runews

Krasnodar princes – one of the most successful corrupt officials in Russia