Ukrainian top officials’ wealth exposed in e-declarations

As the deadline for Ukrainian officials to file online asset declarations nears, around 50,000 top public officials, including civil servants, politicians and judges, have already submitted information.

The e-declarations, as they are known, have to be submitted by the end of Oct. 30, and thereafter all the documents can be found in a publicly searchable database.

The e-declarations submitted so far have already revealed that Ukraine’s top officials keep millions of dollars in hard cash, and own collections of luxurious watches and Faberge eggs, clothes, and even a church.

In a country where the minimum salary is Hr 1,450 ($56) monthly, the e-declaration is a key element of the country’s anti-corruption agenda, a reform backed by the Ukraine’s main creditor – International Monetary Fund.

The e-declaration law demands that officials disclose not only their own assets  but also those held by family members, eliminating the possibility of officials hiding their wealth under the names of relatives.

The Kyiv Post looked into some of the e-declarations by Ukrainian top officials.

Roman Nasirov, head of State Fiscal Service of Ukraine

Official salary for 2015: Hr 36,096 ($1,500).

Declared cash: $1,160,000; 450,000 euros; and Hr 4,350,000

Nasirov, who is in charge of all tax and customs policies, owns some five land plots in the village of Kozyn, an elite Kyiv suburb where the most wealthy Ukrainians live, including President Petro Poroshenko. He also has five apartments in Kyiv and two houses – one in Kozyn with a total of 414 square meters and another one in Vita Poshtova, just 18 kilometers from Kyiv, which totals 199 square meters.

Other property belonging to Nasirov includes Rolex and Breguet watches, while his wife has two Rolex watches, and Breguet, Cartier, and Chopard timepieces. They also declared five jewelry sets by De Beers, two Cartier jewelry sets, five Van Cleef and Arpels jewelry, sets of Damiani earrings and three Hermes bags.

Official salary for 2015: Hr 77, 270 ($3,030).

Declared cash: $870,ooo, 460,000 euros and Hr 2,280,ooo

Groysman, a long-term ally of the president, was appointed as prime minister on April 14. He served as a the mayor of Vinnytsia from 2006 to 2014. According to his declaration, Groysman owns two land plots in Vinnytsia Oblast and two houses –  one of those is 534 square meters in areas, while the other one is 461.1 square meters.

Together with his wife, Groysman declared 12 watches, including ones made by Boucheron, Ulysse Nardin, Rolex, Breguet, Girard-Perregaux, Parmigiani, Audemars Piguet, and Ulysse Nardin. The cheapest Rolex watch costs at least $4,000, according to price tracking websites. For comparison, U.S. President Barack Obama owns a Shinola Runwell Sport Chrono 42mm watch, which he wears on a plain black leather strap. This Detroit-based luxury lifestyle brand model of watch costs $1,100, their website says.

Groysman also owns a 2013 Land Rover.

Nestor Shufrych, Opposition Bloc lawmaker 

Official salary for 2015: Hr 74,942 ($2,939).

Shufrych also earned some Hr 80, 559 while doing other work as a lawmaker.

Declared cash: $4,230,000, 3,750,000 euros and Hr 25,000,000.

Shufrych, a former ally of overthrown President Viktor Yanukovych and now a lawmaker with the Opposition Bloc, owns nine apartments – seven in Kyiv and two in the western Ukrainian city of Uzhgorod. The largest apartment is 467.10 square meters. The lawmaker also has a house of 701.5 square meters in the village of Kozyn in Kyiv Oblast and a 336.3 square meter-house located in Uzhgorod. He also declared a country house in Kozyn with a total area of 400 square meters, and 969 square meter recreation area in the village of Kamianytsia in Zakarpattya Oblast. 

He has a collection of 287 paintings, a 121-piece collection of ancient porcelain, and some 17 watches. He also has a 156-piece firearms collection and a vast collection of 568 knives. According to his declaration, Shufrych is also an antiques collector, with 71 vintage books and some 51 old icons – religious panel paintings.

Shufrych owns a 2008 Land Rover Defender SUV, a 2013 Mercedes-Benz G350 2013, and a 2012 Toyota 4 Runner. 

Valeria Gontareva, governor of the National Bank of Ukraine

Official salary for 2015: Hr 1,754,000 ($68,794)

Deposits: $1,831,000 in state-run Ukreksimbank and Hr 61,9000 in state-owned Oschadbank

Gontareva, who recently topped the list of 100 most influential women compiled annually by Ukrainian magazine Focus, owns a 900-square-meter land plot in Kyiv Oblast, an apartment in Kyiv with a total area of 106 square meters, and a country house (250 square meters). 

Gontareva owns a 2012 Porsche Panamera and a 2013 Porsche Cayenne, while her husband drives a 2006 Toyota Land Cruiser Prado. She didn’t declare any watches, jewelry or valuable paintings. 

Yury Lutsenko, Ukraine’s prosecutor general 

Official salary for 2015: Hr 75,562 ($2,963).

Declared cash: Hr 150,000

Lutsenko, the former interior minister and current prosecutor general, declared an apartment in Rivne Oblast with a total area of 108.6 square meters, owned jointly with his wife, son and brother. He owns only 20 percent of the apartment, while his wife – Iryna Lutsenko who is a deputy head of the Petro Poroshenko Bloc faction  – owns two apartments in Kyiv – 181 square meters and 92 square meters in size respectively. She also owns a house and land in a city of Dubno in Rivne Oblast.

Lutsenko has a collection of books from the late 19th and early 20th century, and a Ulysse Nardin watch. His wife owns a collection of paintings by contemporary Ukrainian artists from 2006-2011, a Dior bag and a Breguet watch among other luxury items. She drives a 2014 Mercedes-Benz GL 500 and a 2012 Toyota Camry. Iryna Lutsenko also had a 2010 Toyota Land Cruiser, which was stolen, according to the declaration. 

Former investigative journalist turned lawmaker Sergii Leshchenko said on Oct. 23 that Lutsenko “had all his properties signed over stooges,” referring to a palatial residence in a downtown Kyiv that reportedly has been registered to Lutsenko’s wife’s accountant. Lutsenko brushed off the accusations. On Oct. 26, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau started checking the information on the real estate.

Among other officials, Gennadiy Kernes, the controversial mayor of Ukraine’s second biggest city Kharkiv, has declared that he has more than $1,600,000 in hard currency. The lawmaker with presidential Petro Poroshenko Bloc Anatoliy Matviyenko has a building of the Assumption church in a village of Byrlivka in Vinnytsia Oblast. Matviyenko has owned a 40.9-square-meter church since 2012. 

A member of the 23-member Vidrodzhennya Party, Gennadiy Bobov, has declared that he has $2,500,000 in cash in state-run Oschadbank, and some jeweled Faberge eggs, while Ihor Kotvitsky, a lawmaker with the former Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk’s People’s Front party, has declared his two Brunello Cucinelli coats, a suit of the same brand, a Christian Dior bag and Loro Piana coat together worth more than Hr 600,000 ($23,533).