Battle over control of Dynamo heads into Ukraine's courts

by Zenon Zawada
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - A fierce battle over control of the Dynamo Kyiv soccer club has spilled into the courts, which have frozen almost all its shares at the request of one of the feuding partners.

The Pechersk regional court ruled on February 23 that 98.71 percent of Dynamo Kyiv's shares are frozen indefinitely after Russian businessman Konstantyn Grigorishin filed a lawsuit to prevent any possible sales.

Mr. Grigorishin currently owns 0.1 percent of a share of Dynamo Kyiv, but stated he wants to take over the soccer club, or 98.71 percent of the remaining shares.

"Although I didn't have the goal of taking Dynamo Kyiv, I will take it out of principle," he said. "My goal is to return the funds that were taken under pretense of Dynamo Kyiv."

Mr. Grigorishin, who owns stock in at least a dozen of Ukraine's power distribution companies, has been in a vicious feud for many years with the Surkis brothers, Ihor and Hryhorii, who own the largest stake in Dynamo Kyiv.

He alleges that the brothers attempted to sell their shares in Dynamo Kyiv after ignoring his request to buy them, he said. As a shareholder, he said, he has the legal right to buy the Dynamo Kyiv shares before they are sold.

At one point, Mr. Grigorishin owned 18 percent of Dynamo Kyiv's shares. His partners authorized a stock split and reduced his stake to a mere 0.1 percent.

As part of the Pechersk ruling, the court has asked that the partners submit all documents related to the stock split, their attempts to sell the stock and all their official meetings.

Hryhorii Surkis claims Mr. Grigorishin never attempted to buy those shares.

"He declared war," said Mr. Surkis. "I didn't write him a ticket for a war. Believe me, I know how to fight. But without weapons, with words. And everything will conform to law."

Ukraine's Minister of the Economy Serhii Teriokhin acknowledged on February 24 that Dynamo Kyiv's owners have had problems in dividing revenues among shareholders and, in particular, hiding revenues from their trades of soccer players.

The infighting among Dynamo Kyiv's partners is not helping Ukraine's image, said Volodymyr Lytvyn, the Verkhovna Rada's chairman.

Several government officials, including Vice Prime Minister Mykola Tomenko, have raised the possibility that the government will take possession of Dynamo Kyiv.

If the Ukrainian government is re-examining the privatization of Kryvorizhstal and Ukrrudprom, then it can just as well reconsider Dynamo Kyiv's privatization, Mr. Teriokhin commented.

Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, March 6, 2005, No. 10, Vol. LXXIII

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