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Photo caption Mykola Solskyi is the first incumbent minister under the presidency of Volodymyr Zelenskyi, to whom NABU announced suspicion of corruption
April 23, 2024
The National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) suspects the Minister of Agriculture and Food, Mykola Solskyi, of illegally taking over state land worth 291 million hryvnias and attempting to take over land worth another 190 million hryvnias.
He himself denies all the accusations and says that he did not have and does not have a relationship with the land that is in question.
Mykola Solskyi headed the parliamentary committee on agrarian policy and land relations before being appointed as a minister, and before being elected to the Verkhovna Rada, he was engaged in agribusiness for many years.
His business partners were, in particular, the former head of Zelenskyi’s Office of the President, Andriy Bohdan, former law partner Ihor Pukshin, and the son of the former head of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine, Oleksandr Baulin.
It was during Solsky’s leadership of the parliament’s agrarian committee that the deputies made a historic decision – to introduce a land market.
It is significant that in recent weeks the press has written that the chair under Solsky is shaking and that he may be dismissed, and the ministry may be subordinated to the Ministry of Economy.
In recent months, Solskyi has been negotiating with the Poles regarding agricultural products and the blocking of borders.
The essence of NABU’s suspicions
NABU indicates that it is about the activities of a top official at the head of a “criminal group”, which included officials of the State Geocadastre bodies, “as well as persons who controlled the activities of these bodies, the so-called curators”.
“Participants of the scheme ensured the destruction of documents on the basis of which two state-owned enterprises in Sumy Oblast had the right to permanent use of the land. Due to their absence, the regional State Geocadastre drew up an act on the arbitrary occupation of these plots,” the NABU said in a statement.
Photo author, NABU
In the future, with the help of controlled officials of the regional State Geocadastre, the agency indicates, plots were handed over to predetermined citizens under the guise of realizing their right to free land.
NABU says that the condition for obtaining ownership of the land was the signing of an agreement on its lease to a private agricultural holding even before the acquisition.
“As a result of the implementation of the scheme during the years 2017-2021, the participants of the scheme took possession of 1,250 land plots with a total area of 2,493 hectares, the value of which at the time of the crime was more than 291 million hryvnias,” the suspicion states.
NABU says that they also tried to take possession of 3,282 hectares of land worth about 190 million hryvnias, but they were prevented by detectives and prosecutors of the SAP, who conducted searches and seized the plots.
Suspicions have been announced not only against Minister Solsky, but also “two curators of the State Geocadastre bodies and the person who contributed to the commission of the crime.” Delivery of suspicions to other persons continues.
What does the minister say?
An interlocutor in the government team in a conversation with BBC Ukraine assumed that Solsky himself could write a resignation letter against the background of a corruption scandal. At least the Cabinet of Ministers did not plan to send such a resolution to the parliament.
However, the minister himself stated that he does not agree with the NABU’s accusations. According to him, the events described by NABU relate to 2017-2018, when he worked as a lawyer and had nothing to do with the use of the land in question.
“The circumstances of seven years ago concern a dispute between state enterprises and natural persons, in particular ATO military personnel for land that was given to the latter in possession in accordance with the law. Disputes are resolved by courts, including the Supreme Court, and as far as I know, to date, a number of decisions state the absence of the rights of state-owned enterprises on land, which NABU probably means,” Mykola Solskyi said in a message to the media.
The minister promised “maximum openness to establish the truth.”
“But there is no need for this either – all data are open to law enforcement officers, and the evidence and arguments of the parties are under consideration by the courts,” he added.
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Photo caption Mykola Solsky in the parliament was a person who played a prominent role in the adoption of the law on the land market
Who is Mykola Solskyi?
Mykola Solskyi became a member of parliament from the Servant of the People party in 2019 in a single-mandate district in the Lviv region. He headed the committee of agrarian policy and land relations, and two and a half years later, in March 2022, he became the minister of agrarian policy and food.
When Mykola Solsky was appointed head of the parliamentary committee, people on the sidelines of the Verkhovna Rada said that he, as an experienced manager, was tasked with passing the law on the land market through the session hall.
Solsky presented this document and stood on the rostrum for many hours, announcing each of about four thousand amendments to the draft law.
According to the analytical online system You Control, Mykola Solsky was engaged in agribusiness for a long time. He was the founder of eight and the beneficiary of ten agricultural companies. He was a manager in three companies.
Solsky conducted a joint business, in particular, with the former head of the Office of the President Andriy Bohdan, former law partner Igor Pukshin, who worked in Viktor Yushchenko’s team in 2004-2009. The son of the former chairman of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine Oleksanr Baulin was also among the business partners.
According to income declarationin 2023, Mykola Solsky received 22.38 million hryvnias of income, most of which – 21.35 million hryvnias – are dividends from agrarian business.
According to the declaration, Solsky owns 9% of the shares in the Agro-Luchki company, 18.73% each in three companies – “Natasha-Agro”, “Rozhnivka-Agro” – which are engaged in the cultivation of grain crops, as well as in the Malodivytsky grain processing enterprise .
According to the declaration, Mykola Solsky transferred the shares in these enterprises to management.
Together with his wife, he owns five cars.
It is known from the declaration that the minister’s wife and three children live in Portugal, where they received the status of temporary protection, and another son studies at a boarding school in Switzerland.
