Ulyukayev’s Detention: Corruption or a Provocation?

The rabid dogs of the Kremlin regime are once again fighting each other and the victim this time is

the Minister of Economic Development Alexei Ulyukaev who was arrested last night.

From early morning on, we’ve been swamped with questions:

you guys at the Anti-Corruption Foundation, do you think that Ulyukaev is a swindler

and don’t you think that the circumstances of his detention are rather strange?

So, here’s the answer. We definitely think that the circumstances of Ulyukaev’s detention are very strange

but we also definitely think that he’s a swindler.

First of all, here’s some exclusive information from our Foundation.

We dug around a bit, looking for information about Ulyukaev and we found

his unregistered offshore company in Cyprus.

The offshore company is quite recent

it was registered in 2011, when Ulyukaev was already a minister, and it’s still active.

It’s registered in the name of Ulyukaev’s father, but we have no doubt

that this is simply an attempt to circumvent the anti-corruption legislation.

It’s unlikely that the 80-year-old Valentin Ulyukaev needs an offshore company to do his business

and it’s unlikely that he’s engaged in any business deals at all.

Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough time to figure out how exactly Ulyukaev used this offshore company.

We can assume that the firm was used for registration of foreign real estate deals

but since the minister has been arrested, and our investigation fell through

we are publishing all of the offshore company documents

in hopes that the journalists will dig deeper to find out what this was all about.

In any case, I believe that when a federal minister and his family have all these secret offshore deals

it says a lot about them.

Second. For many years Ulyukaev has been a chairman of the Supervisory Council of the VTB bank.

VTB is probably the most corrupt Russian company ever, its employees steal openly, and they steal milliards.

And Ulyukaev either took a direct part in this theft, or he covered it up.

I personally remember many VTB shareholder meetings, when the shareholders tried to speak up

and to recount the cases of corruption within the bank

while Ulyukaev tried to keep them from speaking.

Third. Even Ulyukaev’s declared income looks very suspicious.

As you can see, in 2015 he declared an income of 59 mln rubles. That’s almost a million bucks.

That’s two and half times as much as the salary of the US President.

Where does this money come from?

Ulyukaev’s wife declared income of 15 mln rubles a year. What does she do?

What kind of business does she have that earns her more than a million rubles a month?

Such corruption schemes are very typical for the Russian government

where all the officials suddenly have wives who are very successful entrepreneurs.

Fourth. Ulyukaev has been a member of Putin’s government since 2000. That’s 16 years!

For the last three years he’s been a minister

and it makes me laugh so hard, when I hear people call him a «liberal», or a «systemic liberal».

He is a part of this regime, he has grown up with this regime

he has built his fortune and career with the help of this regime.

And in this regard Ulyukaev is no less a part of the corrupt system than Sechin or Shuvalov or Yakunin.

There’s no difference betwen them.

So, to recap — no, we have no doubts that Ulyukaev is involved with corruption.

Speaking of this specific accusation, when they say that he extorted $2 mln from Rosneft

well, that sounds absurd.

I simply cannot imagine minister Ulyukaev come to the head of Rosneft Igor Sechin

one of Putin’s closest friends, and demand:

«Bring me $2 million in a briefcase or else I won’t approve the deal with Bashneft».

I don’t believe that for a second. And I want to specifically point out

that Igor Sechin is a swindler on a much greater scale and that it’s simply absurd

to compare Ulyukaev’s wealth with Sechin’s yachts and homes.

You can take a look at our video just those yachts and homes to see for yourself.

We all understand that the decision on the shoking, harmful and corrupt deal

when Rosneft was allowed to acquire Bashneft, was made personally by Putin and Medvedev.

This is not minister Ulyukaev’s level, and there has been plenty of media coverage of this issue.

I think that the explanation is strictly political.

Putin is afraid that his closest circle may betray him.

Right now, he doesn’t fear the popular revolt or the scheming of the State Department.

He fears the possible conspiracy and betrayal from within the Kremlin and the government.

In order to avoid it, he has to do what all the other authoritarian regimes did

throughout human history — he has to terrorize his own entourage.

By doing this, he’s sending a signal that everyone should be afraid.

To keep people on edge, somebody has to be arrested from time to time

and the more unexpected the person, the better.

The government officials are scared and don’t understand what is happening

everyone is afraid, and there’s no time for the mutinous thoughts.

In order to protect themselves from Putin’s wrath just in case

they have to become even greater minions than they were yesterday.

That’s how I see this. That’s all I wanted to say about Ulyukaev.

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