South African President Cyril Ramaphosa will visit Kiev on Friday as part of his participation in the African peacekeeping mission, where he will meet with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky to discuss a “peace plan” to end the war, the South African presidential press office reported.
Ramaphosa reportedly visited (Warsaw) Poland on Thursday, June 15, where he met with President Andrzej Duda.
The South African president is now on his way to Kiev for talks with President Zelensky. The mission includes leaders from South Africa, Zambia, Comoros, Congo-Brazzaville, Egypt, Senegal and Uganda as representatives of a continent that has experienced the adverse economic effects of war.
Earlier, the South African president held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, President Zelensky, Chinese President Xi Jinping and UN Secretary-General António Guterres.
Ramaphosa wants to make efforts to promote a “peaceful” process to resolve the Russian war against Ukraine. On Saturday, he and his delegation will arrive in Moscow for talks with Putin.
EGYPT, KIEV, PRESIDENT, SOUTH AFRICA, ZAMBIA, Сенегал, Уганда
Kherson Vodokanal received a modular water purification unit worth more than 3 million hryvnias, the regional military administration said.
According to the OVA’s Telegram channel on Thursday, the purchase of the unit was made possible thanks to the Kherson Regional Charitable Foundation “Unification” with the financial support of the United States (USAID) in coordination with the Kherson OVA.
“The cost of the installation is more than 3 million UAH. This mobile container will be effectively used by the city water utility to meet the drinking water needs of Kherson residents and after the liquidation of the consequences of flooding,” the message reads.
The State Property Fund (SPF) has secured payment of UAH 194.4 million for the purchase of the Kosarsk distillery (Kosari village and Smela, Cherkasy region) from Ristone Holdings’ Agrofirma im. Gorky LLC (Kyiv), according to the SPF Facebook page.
The SPF reminded that the privatization auction was held almost a year and a half ago – November 1, 2021. At the auction price increased by 3.3 times – up to UAH 162 million from the starting UAH 49.4 million. Subsequently, the winner filed a lawsuit in court and argued that allegedly the State Property Fund “did not report about the shortcomings of the property of the distillery, which could prevent the winner to fully use the enterprise.
“On May 3, 2023 the Commercial Court of Kiev, based on the forensic examination, denied the plaintiff’s claim. Today, the funds from the privatization came into the state budget and will work to strengthen our defense capability,” the Fund said in a statement.
According to the SPF website, the privatized asset consists of 1.36 thousand items of buildings, structures, movable and other property, including a production building, fermentation department, granary and distillery, bardon pumping station, company store, pig farm, warehouses, hangars, etc.
The object is equipped with the basic technological equipment, as well as the necessary utilities. The capacity of the plant can produce about 35 thousand liters of alcohol per year.
The enterprise is located on nine land plots with a total area of 75.74 hectares in Kosari and Smela.
Ristone Holdings group of companies – vertically integrated agricultural holding, which includes Dnepromlyn LLC, Khlebzavod № 10 LLC, Orel United Elevator LLC, Orelskaya Agrofirma LLC, Agroalliance LLC, Victoria Agrofirma, Gorkiy Agrofirma LLC, Zlagoda SOOO and others.
Ristone Holdings farms 65,800 ha in Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhya regions. The company is engaged in growing grains and industrial crops, cattle breeding, production and wholesale and retail trade of agricultural products, in particular, flour, bread, bakery products, etc.
The founder and head of the supervisory board of the group of companies is Vadim Nesterenko.
As reported, the managing partner of the National E-Exchange, Evgeniya Bozhko, wrote on Facebook in December this year that “Agrofirma im. Gorky” can not realize its right to privatization of Kosar distillery, because half of the storage tanks for finished products at the plant are filled with distilled spirit under arrest since 2012, which makes it impossible to alienate the asset.
Privatization of the alcohol industry involves the State Property Fund sale of 41 distilleries of State Enterprise “Ukrspirt” and another 37 plants, united in the concern “Ukrspirt”. In total, it is expected to raise about 2 billion hryvnias. In 2020, the amount of assets sold at 20 auctions was 1.26 billion UAH.
NNEGC Energoatom expects to complete corporatization of the enterprise, according to optimistic estimates, in half a year, according to pessimistic estimates, in a year, said the president of the company Petr Kotin.
“Energoatom’s corporatization is moving at quite a fast pace. According to pessimistic estimates, it will take us a year to be fully corporatized. On the optimistic side, half a year. There are many processes going on now; one of them is the stocktaking of all assets and collection of creditor claims. This is not an easy procedure,” said Mr. Kotin in his interview to journalists during visit of one of the NPPs.
At the same time, he specified that with regard to the Zaporizhzhya NPP occupied by the Russian invaders “we will use preliminary, pre-war inventory data for the time being, and then (after the return of the plant under Ukrainian control – ER) we will adjust.
As reported, at the beginning of May the Cabinet of Ministers reorganized the state enterprise by transforming it into the National Nuclear Energy Generating Company Energoatom, 100% of the shares in the authorized capital of which belong to the state and are not subject to privatization or alienation in any other way.
As noted by the Prime Minister of Ukraine Denis Shmygal, it will improve the efficiency of management, attract additional funds for new projects and strengthen energy independence.
The Cabinet of Ministers also created a commission for Energoatom’s transformation and approved its composition, set a two-month deadline for lenders to file their claims against the company, and formed an inventory commission.
Before that, on February 6, 2023, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine passed the draft law 8067 on corporatization of the state-owned enterprise Energoatom during the second reading.
The corporatization of Energoatom is stipulated by the loan agreement between the company and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the guarantee agreement “The Integrated Generalized Program of Nuclear Power Plants Units Safety Enhancement,” ratified by Verkhovna Rada.
“Energoatom is the operator of all four operating nuclear power plants in Ukraine. It operates Zaporizhzhya, Pivdenno-Ukrainian, Rivne and Khmelnitsky power plants with 15 power units, equipped with water-water power reactors, with total installed electric capacity of 13,8 GW. The 6GW ZNPP has been under Russian occupation since May 4, 2022.
Temporary control commission of Kyiv City Council requested from JSC “Holding company “Kyivmiskbud” data on the financial results of the construction company for the period from 2019 to 2022 for audit.
“Today at the first meeting of the commission together with colleagues set the task for representatives of the joint-stock company to provide financial statements on activities for 2019-2022 and the first quarter of 2023, as well as complete information about the started, ongoing, suspended and completed construction projects from 2019 inclusive,” the press service of the Kyiv City Council quotes the head of the temporary control commission, deputy of the City Council Miroslava Smirnova.
The commission also requested data from Kievgorstroy on the accrued and paid in 2019-2022 in the budget of Kiev dividends and related calculations, orders and protocol decisions.
Smirnova pointed out that the commission to verify the information was created after journalists published in May an investigation about the activities of the construction company. The deputy reminded that the territorial community of Kyiv owns a controlling interest in the Holding Company Kyivmiskbud in the amount of 80%, thus the inspection is necessary to protect the legal interests of the community.
After the audit will be made proposals regarding the activities of Kyivmiskbud.
Earlier, Kyivmiskbud reported a significant amount of debt under the installment payment agreements – more than 320 million UAH, which prevents the resumption of active construction work at the sites.
According to Openadtabot, Kyivmiskbud in 2022 received 35.8 million UAH net loss against 4.3 million UAH net profit in the previous year. At the same time, the company’s revenue increased by 23% to UAH 1.8 billion.
HC Kyivmiskbud was created on the basis of assets of state municipal construction corporation Kyivmiskbud in 1994 by combining the controlling interests in its share capital of 28 companies and other assets. The CC includes 40 JSCs in which the company holds the shares, six subsidiaries and 51 companies with the rights of the associated member.
The main shareholder of PJSC HC Kyivmiskbud, according to the NCCSD, is the Kyiv City Council (80%).
Traffic in the center of Kyiv will be restricted due to events on Friday, and will be restored later, the press service of the Kyiv City Military Administration reports.
“Tomorrow, June 16, in connection with the events during the day, traffic on the central streets of Kyiv will be restricted,” the statement said.
It is reported that the resumption of traffic will be announced later.
The KCSA urged drivers to plan their routes in advance.
