Ports covered by Lavrishchev's "authority"

According to the correspondent of The Moscow Post, the process of corporatization of Rosmorport has officially begun, however, all the stocks of the new JSC will remain with the state. According to the Ministry of Transport, this will increase the volume of attracted investments, which are just needed for the modernization of port facilities, among which there will probably be the Primorsk ULC of Ilya Traber and the port that is being looked at by Igor Shuvalov from VEB.RF. Is head of the Department Andrey Lavrishchev acting in the interests of a "reputable" businessman and the head of the state Corporation?

But recently, the Ministry of Transport has developed a new special list of port facilities that will be included in the corresponding section of the complex infrastructure modernization plan when it is extended until 2030. According to Kommersant, the projects of Coal Sea  port of Shakhtersk of the East Mining Company, Trade Port Posyet of Mechel, Vanino terminal of RUSAL, and two LPG terminals - NPJS Prime in Muchka Bay and Vostok LNG in Perevoznaya Bay - were excluded from it. The terminal in Zarubino, the Vladivostok seaport facilities for Sollers, and the dry cargo area of the Taman Port were excluded as well.

The development of the latter is likely to be handled by Michel Litvak's OTEKO. And it seems that he doesn't care about the exclusion of the district from the list - they have been waiting for him there for a long time. In Taman, he already has his own dry cargo terminal, which receives state subsidies. Presumably, has he already managed to agree on how to get in private and government support for a new project? After all, even more can be "raised" this way!

So who will benefit from the privatization of Rosmorport?

Control over the sky and water

In the list of enterprises that can still count on support, special attention is drawn to Korsakov Commercial Sea Port. The fact is that the list of shareholders of the company is kept secret. According to the authors of the CitySakh portal, a certain MAXWELL INVEST LTD, registered in the British Virgin Islands, allegedly receives dividends from the company's activities.

Korsakov Commercial Sea Port

In addition, through a chain of legal entities, the company is connected with the Morskiye Vorota Sakhalina, which was supposed to build an international sea passenger terminal in the Korsakov Port, but did not manage to do it. Maybe because no one dared to entrust the money to a very young company without any specialized experience and with an authorized capital of 10 thousand rubles? In this case, it was reasonable: according to Rusprofile, the company has been in the process of bankruptcy since the summer of 2020.

And here is an interesting detail. The fact is that once the founder of the MVS was Ruslan Rumyantsev. The same character sat in the chair of the CEO of KCSP until recently. According to the authors of the Sakh&Co, telegram channel, he allegedly participated in a "raider" attack on the KSTP in 2014. According to rumours, he also "frightens" ex-Director of the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk Air Terminal Nikita Polonsky - say, Rumyantsev was associated with semi-legal business at the airport and he didn't like that he was tried to "get out" from that place.

So, does it mean that until recently, the port was controlled by an "authoritative" character, who also could direct the flow of money to the foreign office?

Presumably, Rumyantsev could "squeeze" the port in the interests of businessman Nikolay Kran, who during the change of ownership in 2013-2014 for some time owned a share in KSTP. Later, as Izvestiya wrote, this story interested law enforcement officers, as they received a statement from the ex-co-owner of the office, Marina Kosheverova, who complained that the business was taken away from her illegally. However, this case did not go far: at the end of 2015, Nikolay Kran died of a heart attack.

And Rumyantsev, apparently, continued to keep the asset with him, expecting that someone else would be interested in it. And presumably the waiting brought results. As reported by Sakhalin,Info, last year VEB.RF announced its desire to develop KSTP. Igor Shuvalov personally expressed the state corporation's interest in the project at a meeting with then acting Governor Valery Limarenko. So maybe, in the end, the port will go to VEB.RF, won’t it? It is noteworthy that a couple of days ago, the CEO of KSTP was replaced...

Decide on concepts?

But we know exactly who is happy that the cash flows will be directed to the modernization of the Primorsk ULC - businessmen with an ambiguous reputation Ilya Traber and Ramis Deberdeev. Both of them are closely connected with the former and current leadership of the Leningrad region, where, in fact, their "patrimony" is located.

Thus, Ilya Traber is called the "night governor" - he "operates" in the region since the time when Valery Serdyukov was the head and now productively cooperates with Alexander Drozdenko. Presumably, his friends from the criminal world can help him establish connections - evil tongues are gossiping that he was connected with the Tambov OCG. It is said that in certain circles he is known by the nickname "Antique Dealer". They say that because of the ambiguous past, he is now even "forbidden" to enter Monaco…

Traber has a lot of controlled assets in the Leningrad region. At the same time, he presumably works not directly, but through a real agent network. In particular, at various times he could be (and still continues) associated with Ust-Luga PTK, LOESK, EFESK. According to Delovoy Peterburg, Traber himself may have been living in Greece for many years.

Mr. Deberdeev previously served as Deputy head of the Federal Property Management Agency for the Leningrad region and he is a more versatile businessman: he was engaged in cheese production, construction, and, of course, ports. Rumours claim that he has his own hidden business - they say, through offshore Investments Limited, he owns the Timber Terminal Factor in the port of Ust-Luga. They say that's why Traber once chose him as a partner - Deberdeev knows a lot about port specifics. The Moscow Post wrote about this in detail earlier.

Now an experienced "port specialists" with joy "will take away" an infusion to the Primorsk ULC? This outcome of events seems quite real.

"Helper" from Rosmorport

At the same time, it is not completely clear where the remaining funds for port modernization will come from or whether they will be taken at all. Critics called the plans of Rosmorport empty and unfulfilled. They say that everything can turn into a banal "dividing" in the interests of current General Director of the enterprise Andrey Lavrishchev.

And how can we not note that all 8 subsidiaries of Rosmorport are unprofitable! The amount of losses ranges from minus 197 thousand rubles for Flot Media to minus 9.9 million for RMP-Taman. At the same time, most businesses have zero revenue, which also suggests that funds may be withdrawn from them.

Lavrishchev's activities have raised questions before. A native of the Ministry of Transport, since 2010, he has been working at Rosmorport - as an Executive Director, then as a General Director, or combining both positions. Perhaps that's why things are going neither not so well in the structure? The company has been trying to be incorporated since 2011, though nothing has changed. The question is, what has the management been doing all these years?

It seems that it helps to "hide" officials whose activities raise certain questions. According to the authors of the Kompromat-Ural portal, allegedly in 2018 Lavrishchev gave a job to Alexander Smirnov, who had to leave his place in the Ministry of Justice because of corruption scandals. For some time, Smirnov stayed in the administrative Department of the GA, and then, apparently, he was "sent" to Rosmorport.

Does it mean that head of Rosmorport Andrey Lavrishchev can act in the interests of "authoritative" guys - Ilya Traber and Ruslan Rumyantsev? The latter may eventually transfer the asset to the VEB.RF. What an interesting symbiosis of state companies and businessmen with an ambiguous reputation from different parts of the country!