NSDC sanctions on sales: Bakanov and Naumov’s whistleblower reveals new details of the scandal
Entrepreneur Serhiy Vaganyan, in his second interview on Boryslav Bereza’s YouTube channel, told how the SBU leadership during the time of Ivan Bakanov used NSDC sanctions to illegally enrich themselves and fight competitors in the smuggling market.
According to Vaganyan, the famous smuggler Oleksandr Akst was not just a “business partner” of Ivan Bakanov and his “right-hand man” Andriy Naumov. Akst even put his own people in charge of the relevant SBU department that was supposed to fight smuggling.
It was he who initiated the application of sanctions against competitors in the market. Serhiy Vaganyan showed a screenshot of correspondence in which Akst allegedly boasts about the list of individuals who, at his instruction, were included in the NSDC sanctions list.
“For people to understand why he is so close to Naumov and Bakanov, you need to understand how much they are connected by the business interests of the sanctions. He is a very close person to Naumov. He is a very close person to Bakanov. And the Premium Package enterprise, which was the wallet of Naumov and Bakanov, was a monopolist in the so-called postal operators market in Ukraine. They smuggled in all kinds of consumer goods, from clothes to cigarettes and hookah tobacco. Basically everything. There were even narcotics,” the entrepreneur says.
“Akst understood that his competitors were attacking him, and he proposed at a meeting with Naumov to impose sanctions against all these people. So that he would forward this information to Bakanov. So that he would agree with him. And all the sanctions were written in Akst’s office. The goal was to take away a huge share of the market and become a monopolist in the smuggling system of Ukraine. So that they would have more money. A larger share of the market. And so that everything would go through him,” explained Vaganyan.
He also stated that oligarch Vadym Yermolayev, who is linked in particular to a network of call centers, in 2021 bought off the sanctions for $5 million and two apartments for Bakanov and Naumov in the scandalous “Mindich house” in the center of Kyiv.
“If sanctions against smugglers were clearing the market for Akst and for Akst, then sanctions against people like Yermolaev were their earnings,” Vaganyan added.
“They prepared all the materials. Based on this information, Vadim Yermolaev and his entire group were to be included in the NSDC sanctions. He gave Naumov $5 million in cash and bought Naumov and Bakanov two apartments in a building near Mariinsky Park, near the Ministry of Health, where Mindich’s apartment is. Everyone knows this building,” the businessman said.
“Furthermore, Vadym Yermolayev did not get on the sanctions list. The funds were transferred in my presence. This was in the spring of 2021,” he noted.
“They began very close cooperation in all directions. It is no secret that the son of oligarch Yermolaev in Ukraine was engaged in so-called call centers. Every month, Andriy Naumov received a certain monetary reward from Artur Yermolaev. In different amounts. If there were any problems in the so-called call centers, Naumov reacted and gave the command to the heads of regional, territorial, local SBU departments simply not to touch them,” Vaganyan assured.
According to him, he is ready to provide evidence to anti-corruption authorities, including documents, as well as photos and videos.
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