Lawmaker Andriy Pavelko has spent more than Hr 21 million or $750,000 over the past two years, including on renting an apartment for $17,000 a month, while not revealing this in his official asset declarations, an investigation by TV show Nashy Hroshy has claimed.
Pavelko, a member of the Bloc of Petro Poroshenko faction in parliament, the head of parliament’s budget committee, and the president of Ukraine’s football federation, lives a luxurious lifestyle inconsistent with his declared annual earnings of Hr 250,000 ($8,930), according to Denys Bihus, an investigative journalist with Nashy Hroshy.
In the Nov. 12 edition of Nashy Hroshy, Bihus showed footage of what he said was a luxury Bently car owned by Pavelko’s partner Yekaterina Chaus, who is unemployed, and the expensive apartment in downtown Kyiv the couple allegedly rent.
The apartment at the Diamond Hill residential complex, which Pavelko is renting for $17,000 a month
Looking into the social media pages of Pavelko’s partner Chaus, Nashy Hroshy spotted luxury items worth about Hr 5 million ($178,000) that she apparently owns.
The apartment allegedly rented by Pavelko and his partner adds an additional Hr 15 million or $500,000 over the last two years to the lawmaker’s overall expenses. Investigators also found that the couple uses a private jet to travel, with the average cost of a trip per person being around $8,000.
As well as his salary, Pavelko has for the past two years declared that he has an additional Hr 30 million in cash. However, the sum of declared cash did not change over the two years, implying that none of this money has been spent over the period.
Pavelko has been the subject of previous corruption scandals: the investigative program Schemes on Oct. 18 reported that three years ago Pavelko created a Saudi-based company to buy equipment for a factory that makes artificial grass.
The Ukrainian Football Federation, which Pavelko heads, then paid his company twice the market price to buy the equipment. The amount overpaid was Hr 30 million, or over $1 million, Schemes said.
The National Anti-corruption Bureau of Ukraine said in June it was looking into Pavelko’s assets. The bureau said it was investigating Pavelko for possible illegal enrichment and falsifying an asset declaration.
However, as a lawmaker, no official case can be brought against Pavelko unless parliament votes to repeal his immunity from prosecution.
