Rinat Akhmetov
A Ukrainian oligarch is a strange creature simultaneously residing in the world of business and politics. Akin to similar species (e.g. Russo oligarchicus), a typical member of the Ukrainian oligarch family has high resilience to adverse environmental conditions, somewhat like cockroaches. But aside from their survival record, oligarchs are rich and in Ukraine they are rich out of proportions.
The latest EDM edition looks at the matter up-close under the title Oligarchs Wield Power in Ukrainian Politics, written by T. Kuzio.
In particular, Kuzio makes a valid point on the question of legal context:
London is fast becoming a refuge not only for Russian but also Ukrainian oligarchs. Russian political exiles, such as Boris Berezovskiy, flee to London while Ukrainian exiles (Ruslan Bodelan) flee to Russia. This is testimony to the different approaches to money laundering and due diligence undertaken by the United States and the EU. In the U.S. former Prime Minister Pavlo Lazarenko was convicted and jailed in 2004 for money laundering $120 million into the United States.
Now a single example of Lazarenko does not prove the claim that the EU lags in anticorruption field, but…
…it is a prominent example - and one that Brussels lacks so far. Presumably, as was discussed here, the recently proposed anticorruption reform in Britain will have a positive affect on the situation, even if the aim there is to deter bribing when conducting business abroad, rather than punish corrupt individuals when those abscond with their wealth to the United Kingdom.
Kuzio continues:
The total worth of the wealthiest 50 Ukrainians is $112.7 billion, as much as two annual Ukrainian state budgets. Ukrainian oligarchs can be found in most factions, including the Socialists, in the 2006-2007 parliament…
[Rinat] Akhmetov’s wealth is $1.5 billion greater than that of Russia’s wealthiest oligarch, even though Ukraine’s population is a third of Russia’s and it does not possess the strategic raw materials, such as oil, gas, diamonds and gold, which are abundant in Russia.
Toward the end, the article gets to the main point of this post - that Ukrainian oligarchs inhabit both the world of politics and business, and in the process they emit the byproduct of corruption. So far, this has not negatively affected the GDP or FDI, but an argument could be made that these economic indicators could benefit if corruption - perception thereof - were to be reduced.
The diversity of Oligarchic support for various Ukrainian political parties - orange, or blue and white is not surprising. There are very obvious benefits for businessmen and women to chummy up with politicians, be it London or Kyiv.
In Ukraine there are at least three other reasons:
Immunity from prosecution, defensive protection against Tymoshenko and access to government funds…
The conclusion succinctly sums up the last three years and a half:
The separation of business and politics remains a long way off in Ukraine, even though it was one of the main aims of the orange revolution.
