Help the rebels and the trail of Yanukovych. What is known about tobacco monopoly Kesaeva “Megapolis”
On 30 March the General Prosecutor of Ukraine Yury Lutsenko reported about the exposure of a large-scale scheme of withdrawal and non-payment of taxes a distributor of tobacco products of OOO “Megapolis Ukraine” (new name “Tedis Ukraine”) under the leadership of the Russian businessman Igor Kesaeva. According to preliminary investigation, the company introduced abroad about 2.5 billion hryvnia, and some of these funds went to Finance terrorism.
Within this case the GPU together with Nicolicea conducted a massive operation – thousands of law enforcement officers conduct searches and other urgent investigative actions at the enterprises of the monopoly in Kiev, Odessa and the Dnieper. TSN.Eeyore gathered together in a single material all that is known about the controversial company and its relations with Russia.
Company “Megapolis” became a monopolist
The company was established in 2011 as an LLC “Trading company “Megapolis-Ukraine”, in may 2016 was renamed LLC “TEDIS UKRAINE”. It is one of the leading Ukrainian distribution companies and in tobacco.
On the company’s website States that she is “one of the largest tax payers of Ukraine” according to the DFS and listed in the “budgets of different levels” for 2016, 1.5 billion. But taken out of Ukraine, according to the PGO, was 2.5 billion.
The company strengthened its position in the Ukrainian market during the presidency of Viktor Yanukovych and actually controlled 95% of cigarettes in our country. It was confirmed in the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine.
“About 30 companies have licenses for wholesale trade in tobacco products. But as we can see from the statistics, about 95% of cigarettes that are produced for subsequent delivery to the Ukrainian market, are implemented first company “Megapolis Ukraine”, – said the head of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine Yury Terentyev.
In fact, the four largest manufacturers of cigarettes in Ukraine – “British American tobacco”, “tobacco Japan”, “Imperial tobacco” “Philip Morris” – sell the products of one company or distributor, which is itself distributes it to the shops.