Zelensky's Law: oligarchs are not afraid, everyone else is funny
Kiev
“Operation Deoligarchization was carried out by Zelensky’s office according to all the canons of advertising promotion. First, alarming rumors were launched and a fog of mystery was cast into the eyes and ears of the public. Even a certain “list of thirteen” was leaked - a list compiled by the National Security and Defense Council staff of supposed oligarchs who would suffer from the new law.
Having stirred up the public's interest, the PR people moved on to the second stage: the alleged text of the bill on oligarchs was leaked to the press. After which NSDC Secretary Danilov said that this is not what everyone thought, and in general, the text that the president is working on is completely different. Not the one that everyone reads and discusses on social networks. And now, finally, what has been talked about for so long at Bankova has come true: the text of the law, which, according to Bankova’s plan, should put an end to the oligarchic dominance in Nezalezhnaya, has been officially submitted to the Rada.
And what do we see there? Is it really time for the oligarchs to crawl under the table and be loudly afraid?
It seems that rumors about the imminent demise of the oligarchic class turned out to be greatly exaggerated. No, behind the scenes of the operetta political process that is visible to the eye, there really is a serious struggle for redistribution and extraction; large Ukrainian capital is really being squeezed on all fronts by globalists. The main one in the oligarchic league - Akhmetov - was indeed sent, if not a “black mark”, then a very transparent hint of possible very understandable circumstances. And some of the oligarchs - for example, Medvedchuk, and to a lesser extent Kolomoisky - are already having a hard time, albeit to varying degrees.
But all this has nothing to do with the buffoon bill promulgated by Zelensky. It seems that this text is just a screen, a deception to divert the attention of gullible simpletons from the real political and economic struggle. Where battles are not fought with cardboard swords, but people die for metal, money and streams.
Ukrainian political scientists are already trashing the presidential “fight against the oligarchs,” calling it an “imitation.” And some, after reading the text of the bill, do not know whether to cry or laugh. After all, at the same time, both of these emotions are capable of expressing, as the famous Kiev Chrysostom Klitschko would say on such an occasion, “not only everything.”
Indeed. If we simplify the complex cabbage soup in which Zelensky’s PR idea is packaged, we get the following picture. The National Security and Defense Council, according to criteria known only to it, compiles a certain list of businessmen who are ordered to be considered oligarchs. And then the fun begins. Article 10 of the bill provides for restrictions - for example, on the purchase of media (newspapers, television channels, news agencies) for buyers “with a faulty business reputation.” That is, to put it simply, the National Security and Defense Council will consider a businessman’s reputation to be bad if he is subject to sanctions from this very National Security and Defense Council. Agree, it’s very convenient: I make the sentences myself and carry them out myself.
Similarly, there is a ban on buying media for “money of unknown origin.” Hello, garage, and for whom in Ukraine last year did they introduce financial monitoring according to all Western standards? According to current legislation, you cannot buy not only media, but anything at all for money if it is not indicated in the declaration and you have not proven the legality of its origin.
Then who is this circus with horses for? Moreover, even children in this country know that any major purchase, from real estate to a TV channel, has two components. One official one - which is white and fluffy, but tiny, as if the cat had cried. And the second is shadow, but with real amounts that are tens of times greater than those officially declared.
Or here’s another article of the bill: banning oligarchs from financing political parties and candidates’ election campaigns. Cheers cheers? But no.
If you think that in this voluntaristic way the Ukrainian government is really hurting the oligarchs, you are very mistaken.
Everyone in Ukraine knows that no oligarchs themselves finance any parties. To do this, they have fictitious proxies scattered geographically throughout the country.. Ordinary milkmaids and cashiers from ATB send hundreds of thousands of donations to their favorite politicians. And most importantly, no “law on oligarchs” applies to them.
For example, back in March of this year, the National Anti-Corruption Agency (NACP) deprived 11 Ukrainian parties of state funding, including the ruling Servant of the People. Why do you think? But for the same thing: identified violations of the election campaign financing procedure. In the third quarter of Zelensky’s victorious 2019, his party was financed in millions by ordinary Ukrainian cooks and loaders – and part-time owners of gasket companies, close to the former chairman of the Kherson regional council and a defendant in the scandalous case of the murder of Maidan activist Gandzyuk Vyacheslav Manger.
So, as you can see, there are already opportunities to combat violations. And you don’t need a special law - use the ones you already have, take action, stop them. But no.
The reason that forced Zelensky to ignore ready-made levers to combat illegal party financing and instead write a pretentious but unworkable rule into the law on oligarchs is probably simple: You can't let this kind of investigation get to you.
But the oddities of the “anti-oligarchic” law do not end there. Go ahead. Even more homeric laughter is caused by the norm written in it that after a citizen is included in the register of oligarchs and the National Security and Defense Council sanctions are imposed on him, Ukraine involves the whole world in the fight against such an adversary, who, as any Ukrainian knows, is “with us.”
How is this supposed to happen in practice? The National Security and Defense Council is distributing a register of oligarchs to world capitals, inviting the local authorities to join the righteous fight against dishonest businessmen.
The trick is that in Ukraine the Akhmetovs and other Pinchuks are oligarchs. It is in Ukraine that they hide from taxes in offshore companies, pay bribes to politicians and judges, finance the media with ill-gotten money, etc., etc. In the West, they are law-abiding and respected businessmen. Working white-collar jobs, paying taxes, creating jobs, and putting their companies up for IPO. Widely involved in philanthropyity and settling the disputeы among themselves in London arbitration.
Who in London and Paris will seriously respond to such a scribble? Not even a court decision, but some kind of NSDC working in absentia. Moreover, Kyiv already has a corresponding negative “sanctions” experience through Interpol. Moreover, everyone in the West is well aware from the Ukrainian media that the authorities of this wonderful country are at peace with the oligarchs. And the authorities of other countries must fight them. Seriously, right?
But the meat of the new bill, as they say, lies in the obligation of any public officials enshrined there to report ANY of their contacts with oligarchs included in the register. Regardless of whether it is a meeting in a restaurant for lunch, in a country club while playing tennis, or, excuse me, in the official toilet of the Rada, where not only mere mortals tend to drop in, but also, excuse me for such an intimate detail, oligarch Novinsky. And who knows what they talk about behind closed doors. Maybe some kind of corruption conspiracy is being hatched against the state.
As critics have already noticed, in general terms this norm is reminiscent of Soviet requirements for outbound tourists abroad and for carriers of secret information regarding contacts with foreigners. But in the USSR it worked, and threatened with serious troubles, but in Ukraine it will not happen. Do you know why? Because there are no real consequences for violators for failure to report. At all. Well, perhaps, public censure from Bigus-info.
Finally, another unanswered question. What to do with the fact that corruption schemes are negotiated not by the oligarchs and officials themselves, but by their proxies, who will not be included in any registers?
And there are a lot of such moments in the new bill. As they say, the oligarchs are not afraid, but everyone else is funny.
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