Russian "oligarchs"

[Euro-commuter]

Khodorkovsky, the head of Yukos, and a number of other private sector multi-millionaires in Russia are thoroughly unpleasant people. In the mid-1990s they were the so-called 'Russian mafia' but have since been sanitised by calling them 'oligarchs' - starting around the time the British government started welcoming them with open arms (Berezovsky, Abramovich,...). These people are now mostly in their 30s, and got rich in the early 1990s when in their 20s. How on earth did they get so rich so young and so fast ? By opportunism and theft. If you recall, Yeltsin's government issued a "privatisation voucher" to every Russian citizen. Those who had no imagination sold their vouchers for cash, at sizeable discounts, as soon as they could. They were the lucky ones. Others - such as my wife and her parents - invested their vouchers in one of very many "funds". What happened to these funds? Almost without exception they simply disappeared. At the same time a small number of people finished up with huge numbers of privatisation vouchers and simply took control of Russian industry when it came up for sale. They bought it with vouchers rather than with cash. That is how these people got rich. They stole Russian industry from the Russian people. They managed to do it because there wasn't enough legal protection in place to prevent it (heaven knows, it's hard enough to prevent scams in the west! Bre-X anyone?). So if Putin has to backdate a few laws in order to catch the bad guys, he has the full support of the majority of the Russian people. And mine too.

I wonder if any Russian can be tempted out of semi-retirement to comment on this?

[Paddy]

Vouchers were sold for a number of reasons, many of them were that some people were near starving. I visited of block of flats in Tomsk where the local government flats were given away to the occupants. What happened afterwards was that many of the drug addicts then sold the their own flats to buy drugs. ( The flats were priced at around £25,000 )

There are two sides to the get rich in the CIS story. Many of the oligarchs who came to the UK, came with the blessing of certain government ministers. The UK governments is really pushing ant Russian propaganda at the moment. I believe it is because of Putin’s stance on the state getting back some of the wealth and assets that were squandered under privatisation.

[AtW]

Paddy - stick to drinking vodka and leave Russian politics analysis to those who have a clue.

Khodorkovsky was and still is a very decent man - a rarity among rich people. Note that he is in jail but other oligarchs are buying English football clubs paying routinely paying £30 mln per football player while in their own country there is still great poverty. Some sons of scumbag who stole people's money in 1998 are even buying UK car manufacturers only to bankrupt them and treat workers like sh1t - buying back company from adminstration for fraction of the cost thus avoiding paying redundancy.

Ask yourself - why Khodorkovsky is in jail in a country known for its corruption where money can buy justice and why Abramovich is not? The reason is simple - Khodorkovsky had political ambitions and this is what got him in jail. He had cheek to tell Putin publicly in Kremlin when he was invited with other oligarchs who stayed silent (and thus rich) that FSB - former KGB was corrupt and was taking bribes - he said that friends of Putin are corrupt people that bought some other oil company for themselves. That's why Khodorkovsky is in jail - he was offered by Kremlin chance to flee the country like others, but he chosen to stay knowing full well he will go to prison sentenced by kengooroo court. How many of you would go to prison for your principles? How many of those of you who would do that would go to serve long prison sentence in Russian prison near former Uranium mines? How many of rich people do this choice? Next to none - he did however showing that he was a decent man who was not corrupted by money.

I know his company - it was located in the region where I lived: I have first hand accounts of people I trust that Khodorkovsky was paying decent money to his employees at the time when everyone else was paying sh1t even though these workers were getting oil from the ground that actually made those owners rich: Khodorkovsky was investing money into pension fund for his workers, he was paying for university courses to teach them - heck he was doing more for workers than actually happens in the west.

I had voucher and I invested it wisely - I am about to sell shares I bought with it and the amount it should generate is indeed very tidy - high 5 digit number in pounds, of course there were others who sold their vouchers for bottle of vodka - it was their fking choice. Whose fault it is that population of Russia is generally so fking dumb? Maybe communist rule destroyed all common sense and drove all half-decent people to death or out of country, but still, this does not absolve population of ultimate responsibility, just like Germans are guilty of voting and supporting Hitler, in the same way Russians (or Soviets) are guilt of supporting scumbags and staying silent when decent people were sent to prison.

Putin is getting wealth back my arse: most of Russian wealth is made of oil and gaz exports, given prices now at $70 per barrel, when they were $10 per barrel before in 1999 when Putin came to power it is obvious that Putin himself did not do much. Sure oil companies are owned privately, but - the State is making money by taking export duty which is much higher than actual money gotten by the companies that actuall get the oil. This is the same situation like in the UK - petrol now costs £1 per liter, but out of this amount Gordon gets 80 pence.

What this means is that it does not matter who owns oil companies - the Russian state always gets its huge cut from any oil sent to export - this means "taking back wealth" is totally unnecessary because the state gets his cut regardless of anything. But of course Putin's friends want to own property, which is why they took it back - for themselves, not for the state.

Christ Paddy lay off vodka - you made me use my posting quota up to Nov 2007, ya commie loving bastid

[Moscow Mule]

EC - where is that from?

Sounds a bit like La Russophobe?

[Euro-commuter]

...
Christ Paddy lay off vodka - you made me use my posting quota up to Nov 2007, ya commie loving bastid

Good post, though. Thanks.