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Hi, today is a great day. Right now, together with
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you, we’re going to remove from office
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a United Russia member — and not just any ordinary one,
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but a big, heavyweight one, the biggest United Russia figure
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in Moscow. Of course, Sobyanin is number one, but our
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old acquaintance Andrei Metelsky
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fits the bill too — after all, he’s the leader of United Russia in Moscow.
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Metelsky is an important figure, and despite the fact
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that we found a billion-ruble business empire linked to him
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and numerous real estate holdings in Austria,
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no one fired him. More than that, both City Hall and
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the Kremlin intend to make him
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a deputy again in the election that will take place on September 8.
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As everyone knows perfectly well, a deputy,
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or a minister — in fact, any public official — is
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strictly prohibited from engaging in business activities.
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At one point, Gennady Gudkov was stripped of
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his parliamentary mandate because he
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signed some document in
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a company’s founding paperwork.
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And right now, former minister Abyzov
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is facing criminal charges because
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he was engaged in business while serving as
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a minister — illegal entrepreneurial
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activity.
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That is precisely why
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Metelsky registered all his property in the names of
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his mother and son, so there would be no
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formal proof that he was running
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his business. Because, officially, I don’t own it — I
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naturally transferred this business to my mother.
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And Metelsky is probably watching this video right now,
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smirking and thinking: exactly,
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formal proof. And anything you
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try to present against me on your YouTube channel,
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I’ll just call a fake. And if you
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don’t agree, then take it to my court — ha-ha-ha.
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Well, we already went to court, believe it or not. And
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the thing is, the evidence on the basis of which
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United Russia leader Metelsky
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should be immediately stripped of
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his parliamentary mandate
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is not our evidence — it’s your
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evidence. It’s evidence from the court.
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We obtained it in a Russian court, the very kind
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that Metelsky and his people are so fond of.
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There’s even the prosecutor’s office involved. What we ended up with is not so much
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an investigation as some kind of
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radio drama — but it’s very interesting and
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informative. It’s the inside story and
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the small details of who
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this United Russia deputy really is.
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[music]
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In the spring of 2015, in his nineteenth year
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in public service, Metelsky decided
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to buy himself a business — specifically, a motorcycle dealership,
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a motorcycle shop and service center
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called Alpin, located
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in Krylatskoye. This is a completely real,
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long-established official dealer
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of Yamaha vehicles; I think many motorcyclists
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know it very well. The previous owners
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were happy to sell because business was going
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rather poorly.
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And everything would have been perfectly normal if
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their path hadn’t crossed with deputy
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Metelsky, who is not just a deputy
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and businessman, but someone who also personally handles
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the smallest aspects of his business.
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Metelsky buys this company, and almost
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immediately, during the purchase process, a
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conflict arises: the old and new owners
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couldn’t divide up a forklift. And that forklift is where it all
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started to spiral.
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Metelsky burst into my office dressed casually,
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in a tracksuit, just like that,
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and, you know, I was simply
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stunned.
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Of course, I’m well aware of his oratorical
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skills, because he spent 20 years in the Duma (Russia’s parliament),
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but the fact that he was so fluent in Russian
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obscenities, honestly, I had never
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imagined. He was saying absolutely
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disgraceful and offensive, and for me upsetting,
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things — namely, that I was allegedly trying
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to steal a forklift from what was essentially his company.
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The forklift was returned, but, as they say,
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the unpleasant aftertaste remained. And now is the right time
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to explain what it is you’ve just
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been listening to. That was Vasily Lopakhin,
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the former director and owner of a small
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stake in the Alpin motorcycle dealership. Did you notice
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that keyboard tapping sound
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in the background of his story? That’s
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the judge’s assistant typing up the transcript. What you’re
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hearing is a recording of a court hearing
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that took place at the beginning of this year. Lopakhin
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is now in a penal colony, sentenced to 3 years and 4
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months.
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And it was Metelsky personally who sent him there. By the way,
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take a look: in January of this year
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he was personally sitting on a bench outside
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the courtroom, waiting to be called in
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to testify. I can only say: well, let’s
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meet and talk.
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If there’s interest, let’s talk. We
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met with Lopakhin, and he said that
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there really would be a sale, and we would like
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to make it happen. Fine, that works.
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Now, before you hear and learn
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a lot more interesting things, let me specifically
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make one reservation: we are completely leaving out
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the substantive side of the case. Right now it doesn’t matter to us
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what the conflict was about, who deceived whom,
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whether there was fraud or
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there wasn’t, and so on. What interests us is something
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entirely different. During this trial,
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dozens of witnesses were questioned — employees
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of the dealership, from directors to mechanics. And
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when a witness testifies in court, their
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words have a completely different status compared
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with, say, an interview or a social media post.
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There, there is criminal liability:
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everyone is warned, papers are signed,
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and if you lie, you can go to prison. They
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were discussing whether there was fraud or not,
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but alongside that, for the court,
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the broader context was naturally being examined as well.
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What was happening, who was making the decisions, who
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was responsible for what, yes, and the meetings and other
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various details—that is what interests all of us
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All the witnesses were asked the same question:
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who is the new owner of the motorcycle dealership, and who
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was running it? Let’s hear what, well,
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for example, a salesperson from this motorcycle dealership
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Mr. Nedelko—what connection does he
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have?
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The company Orbi? Well, as I understood from his
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remarks at other meetings, which were not
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in 1908, that he is the owner of the company
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Alpin. Well, when a person says, “mine, my,”
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“all this is mine, and in an hour we’ll fix it all here,”
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Metelsky.
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Well, at the meeting when Metelsky seated
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all the employees in the middle of the hall: “Now we have
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a new hall, we’re going to put everything here in order now.”
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How strange: why would a deputy (elected lawmaker),
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who is prohibited from engaging in business,
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gather all the employees and
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present himself as the owner? Maybe
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the HR department can explain that to us.
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Let’s hear from an employee there.
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He was introduced as the top manager,
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apparently. What an astonishing
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story. Now let’s give the floor to the economist of this
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dealership. Did Metelsky come there, and how did
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he introduce himself? The meeting was about
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his introduction, yes—the owner
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who, hello,
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was acquiring it. It was specifically
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the presentation of Metelsky as the owner; he
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introduced himself and introduced his
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team, which would be handling
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the development. So, already three people
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who are under criminal
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liability for perjury
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are repeating, word for word, the same
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thing: Metelsky is the new owner of the motorcycle dealership.
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Metelsky makes the decisions, gives
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instructions, and those decisions are binding
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for execution. So who is Metelsky, then?
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A director? A manager? A businessman? About this
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absolutely all the employees knew. Kalach told me that
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he told me that
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a buyer had been found, and that buyer would be
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the deputy chairman
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of the Moscow City Duma (Moscow’s city parliament), Mr.
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Andrei Nikolaevich Metelsky.
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I constantly saw Mr.
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Metelsky’s car arriving in the morning as if
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he were going to work at Alpin and staying there
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for several hours.
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As I learned from Alpin employees,
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whom I knew well, as I already
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said, he would come there
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and hold meetings there about renovating the entire
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Alpin premises.
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Let me remind you that you and I are paying
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Metelsky 6 million rubles a year (about 6 million RUB annually)
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so that he goes to work at the Moscow
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City Duma; he is provided with
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official housing and a car with a driver
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so that he can get to
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his parliamentary office as quickly as possible and nothing
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distracts him from serving
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us Muscovites. And where does Metelsky go instead?
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As it turns out, to his illegally purchased
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motorcycle dealership. In the first year—well, no, I don’t
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remember exactly—maybe for half a year, he stopped by almost every day,
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every day. And if we really want
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to fully assess
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Metelsky’s involvement in the process
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of managing his
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motorcycle business, then we need to keep listening
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to the mechanics. In the testimony, what
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was Metel’s relationship to the company, and how was he
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described? Please explain in more detail.
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Describe it. Well, like a tsar. Yes, basically that’s
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what they called him—a tsar—because without
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well, as I just said, without his
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knowledge nothing could be done, right down
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to, I don’t know, installing a sink
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or a urinal.
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He even, together with me,
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ordered spare parts—tuning parts were needed.
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Yes, we went, tried things out; he came here for that.
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That took an hour. I was walking around when I
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... this meeting was held for them.
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Did he take part? Yes. How did he present himself?
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He didn’t really label himself in any particular way,
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he just spoke, and everyone sat there
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like obedient listeners and followed his instructions.
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As for Volpin’s activities,
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it was absolutely enforced.
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The unquestioned top boss.
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Don’t you think so, Andrei Nikolaevich?
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In everything that was happening at Orbi after 2015,
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well, Andrei Nikolaevich was mentioned throughout, because
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everything that was done was done on his instructions,
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even
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by the directors, but in general
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we now have six witnesses
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six people who, under threat of
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criminal liability,
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separately from one another state that
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Metelsky is the sole owner,
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the sole manager, the only
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person who makes decisions about
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the business, right down to the installation of urinals.
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This is such a blatant and so
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unambiguous violation of the law
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that there is really nothing more
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to discuss here. But for the sake of objectivity, we will give
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the floor to Metelsky himself. Let’s
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listen to how he explains exactly what
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connects him to the Alpin motorcycle dealership. For
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me, it was interesting that in fact
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this is actually one of the oldest
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motorcycle schools in the city of Moscow,
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and in fact I used to do motocross,
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and naturally I very much wanted
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for it to be preserved. Moreover, there
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was an understanding and a desire to open a children’s
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motorcycle school on the basis of Alpin as well, and
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somehow develop it further as of today. And also, why?
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Because it is important.
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This initiative is important, and a lot depends on
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the boys and girls who would like to
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get involved in motorsports. For
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the boys and girls—he, you understand, was there for them.
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He gathers employees at meetings,
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handles repairs, spends hundreds of millions
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of rubles, and in the end the director
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was sentenced to three years. And all of this was supposedly for
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the boys and girls who want
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to do motorsports. For their sake, he
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went several times for talks with
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the management of Yamaha in Russia
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Then there was another meeting, absolutely
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definitely after the acquisition, I remember.
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We went to Yamaha, even though I
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had arranged a meeting with
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the management—and the young man too, because
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there were questions about debts owed to
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Yamaha.
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Something in the range of, I think, 100 million rubles
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What surprised Ivanovsky at first—please lay out
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the sheet... three inches... I would have liked to meet with him
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and somehow get this issue
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sorted out.
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But as for the question of why
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Metelsky, instead of going to the Moscow City Duma,
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went to work at the motorcycle center every day, we also
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have an answer: “I got tired of it, I’m there often, you know,”
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“it’s not interesting there anymore. Secondly,”
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“I love machinery. Thirdly, it’s a company not only
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for selling equipment but also for
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repairs. I had my own equipment repaired there, and
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they repair equipment.”
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At this point it’s even awkward—at least you could have
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looked at your own disclosure, Mr.
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Metelsky. You don’t own any equipment—neither
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a Yamaha,
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nor anything else. In 10 years, you have never once
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declared a motorcycle, or
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a snowmobile, an ATV, or anything
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of that kind that could be repaired.
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You’re in court—you need to be more careful with your words.
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We are sending a complaint to the prosecutor’s office,
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the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the FSB, the Investigative Committee, and the Moscow City Duma,
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and we will even write to United Russia (the ruling political party). I don’t know
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how Metelsky can “take care of” this
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little issue. We would need to open
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more than 10 criminal cases against all the people
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who, without coordinating with one another,
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apparently slandered him under oath.
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The situation for Metelsky is genuinely
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catastrophic. On the record, in court, he himself
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says: “Yes, several times I
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went to Yamaha to deal with
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the settlement of a commercial
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company’s debt.” That is precisely the kind of business activity that
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is prohibited for deputy Metelsky.
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For Metelsky, the leader of United Russia in Moscow, on September 8
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there will be a direct clash between
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all of us and Metelsky with his party.
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Moreover, residents of Izmailovo and Golyanovo
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will be dealing with Metelsky personally,
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while everyone else will be dealing
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with the people running in their districts—
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the same kind of United Russia politicians as Metelsky. Don’t sit
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on the couch—we have a chance to
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throw all of them out of parliament. Simply
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everyone needs to come and vote the same way,
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in line with Smart Voting.
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Register, and we will send you the name
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of the strongest challenger. If at least
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15 percent of the residents of Izmailovo and Golyanovo
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come out and vote for that
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strongest challenger, then I guarantee there will no longer
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be a deputy Metelsky. If he wants to be
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a businessman, good riddance.
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And in every district
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in every city, this is how Smart
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Voting can work.
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If you have already registered yourself, then
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bring a friend, or your parents, or your children.
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On September 8 there will be a fight against United Russia,
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and we must win it. Subscribe
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to our channel—this is where the truth is told.