Colleagues, businessmen, no-names: Who became advisers to the newly elected Head of ARMA Olena Duma?

Olena Duma, who became the Head of the ARMA (National Agency of Ukraine for finding, tracing, and management of assets derived from corruption and other crimes (abbr. – Asset Recovery and Management Agency or ARMA)) a month ago, initiated personnel changes. Initially, the head of the HR department and the head of the legal department were dismissed. Later on, seven advisers were appointed. Since six out of the seven advisers are part-time, they do not have access to state secrets. However, they accompany the agency's director to most working meetings and discuss matters related to management and asset tracing under the ARMA's jurisdiction. Mind analysed the background of Olena Duma's advisers based on publicly available information. Who are these individuals and do they have experience that could be valuable in the context of the agency's functions?

Why is this important? In the conditions of martial law, the National Agency for finding, tracing, and management of assets is not an ordinary authority. The ARMA traces and identifies the assets of corrupt individuals and sanctioned citizens of the russian federation, manages the assets already seized from them, works with pre-trial investigation materials, conducts international asset tracing, has access to all possible registries and databases, and so on.

Read also: 6,800 russians and 53 oligarchs: How the Security and Defence Council and the Justice Ministry confiscate russian assets during the war

Read also: Effectiveness 0.05%: How does the Asset Recovery Management Agency 'take care of' confiscated russian assets?

According to regulations, before assuming their duties, government officials undergo a series of checks. These include verifying whether any prohibitions prescribed by the Law on Government Cleansing are applicable to them. Additionally, every individual, even a regular employee, is checked by NACP (National Agency on Corruption Prevention), NABU (National Anti-Corruption Bureau), SSU (Security Service of Ukraine), MIA (Ministry of Internal Affairs), Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Health, and other bodies in terms of potential criminal activities, connections with the russian federation, legitimacy of acquired income and property, possession of corporate rights, health status, education, attitude towards military service obligations, and more.

However, both permanent and part-time advisers do not undergo any of these checks. Nevertheless, in practice, the head of the organisation grants them access to documents and processes that occur within the agency.

Read also: Ten candidates are vying for ARMA leadership. What is known about each

What are the powers of the advisers? Government officials carry out tasks and functions of the state. Permanent advisers are employees of the advisory service but are not government officials. Therefore, they do not have the right to participate in the execution of state tasks and functions.

Even during the competitive selection process for the position of head of the ARMA, there were questions from the public regarding Olena Duma's potential russian connections. Advisers (theoretically at least) could serve as agents of influence, capable of gathering information and influencing the head towards decisions favourable to the russian federation. Do investigative bodies like NABU, SSU, National Police, SBI (State Bureau of Investigation), and ESBU (Economic Security Bureau of Ukraine) know that information from their criminal proceedings related to asset tracing and management in Duma's office could be accessed by third parties?

Yuriy Petrovsky – the sole permanent adviser to the head of ARMA

Before becoming an adviser to Olena Duma, in April 2023, Yuriy Petrovsky was dismissed from the position of Deputy Minister for Strategic Industries of Ukraine and European Integration. He held this position for two years.

Most of Petrovsky's work in state bodies was related to foreign economic activity. Since 1998, he held managerial positions in the Ministry of Industrial Policy, the International Trade Chamber, the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade of Ukraine, the State Information and Analytical Centre for Monitoring External Goods Markets SE, and the Ministry of Strategic Industries.

From the first day of his appointment as an adviser, Yuriy Petrovsky has requested that the ARMA team perceive him as the deputy of Olena Duma. Mind's sources within the agency claim that Petrovsky has announced that he will soon indeed assume the role of the First Deputy Head of ARMA, hinting that he has connections to the Office of the President.

Recalling: in 2012, Petrovsky was part of the Interdepartmental Commission on International Trade. This same commission included Ihor Shurma – at the time, Deputy Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine (during Viktor Yanukovych's presidency). Ihor Shurma's son – Rostyslav Shurma – currently holds the same position.

Pavlo Velykorechanin and Stanislav Kostiuchenko

Lawyers who became known to the Ukrainian public due to a lobbying scandal in 2021. They founded the public organisation Transatlantic Dialogue And Engagement Centre, which entered into a contract with the American lobbying company Finsbury Glover Hering to provide consulting services to the Sluga Narodu (Servant of the People. – Mind) political party for the purpose of "enhancing Ukraine's relations with the United States and EU countries." The cost of the lobbying services was $50,000 per month. Journalists raised questions about who exactly provided these funds – as the information was never made available to the public.

The second person in the photo above is adviser Pavlo Velykorechanin – a professional lawyer who wrote a dissertation on the topic of multiple citizenship. He is a co-founder of the legal firm Legal Tradition. From 2014 to 2019, he was an assistant to Ruslan Solvar, the Petro Poroshenko Bloc Member of Parliament. This MP is known for voting in favour of the 'January 16 laws' in 2014 and against the Law on recognising Ukrainian sovereignty over the occupied territories of the Donetsk and Lugansk oblasts.

Both lawyers were assistant MPs at the time of signing the contract: Velykorechanin was an assistant to Oleksandr Tkachenko, and Kostiuchenko was an assistant to Ivan Shynkarenko. Both MPs are part of the parliamentary committee on anti-corruption policy.

The chair of this committee, Anastasiya Radina, is also a member of the Sluha Narodu faction. She has criticised the ARMA's work in sessions of the Temporary Investigative Commission of the Verkhovna Rada. Therefore, it appears that Velykorechanin and Kostyuchenko serve as 'supervisors' from the Sluha Narodu party, overseeing Olena Duma's daily work. Photos from working meetings regularly appear on the official page of the ARMA, showing these advisers seated alongside Duma.

Vadym Hrona – Adviser on Legal Affairs and Information Technologies

Although most information available in public sources pertains to Vadym Hrona as a developer working in Kyiv Oblast, there is limited information about his legal expertise.

His photo and social media pages are not available in the public domain. However, it is known that he has been involved in legal matters for a long time. Twice, Hrona served as an assistant to Members of Parliament. In 2006-2007, he assisted Volodymyr Tolstenko, the Chairman of the Subcommittee on Procedural Legislation of the Committee on Justice (Yuliya Tymoshenko Bloc). In 2010-2012, he was an assistant to Yuriy Tregubov, the Secretary of the Committee on Legal Policy (Party of Regions).

Later on, Vadym Grona founded several companies engaged in the purchase and sale of real estate: Vizant LLC, Gold Terra Build LLC, Kors Oil Purchase LLC, and Provident LLC.

His projects in recent years have been publicly known in Boryspil Rayon (village of Shchaslyve) and in Gostomel (Gostomel Residence residential complex).

In recent years, there have been several scandals involving land acquisition in Kyiv Oblast involving Hrona's companies. For instance, in 2021, the Kyiv City Council was involved in a lawsuit against Provident LLC, accusing the firm of illegally taking possession of a land plot and demanding its return to the ownership of Zolochiv Village Council.

In 2022, according to the Boryspil District Prosecutor's Office, Provident LLC allegedly unlawfully seized a land plot within the territory of Zolochiv Village Council. The Prosecutor's Office also demanded in court to return the land to the community. Regarding how Vadym Grona's activities are connected to information technologies, there is no information available in the public domain.

Dmytro Khanykin – Adviser on Legal Affairs

There is no public information available about Dmytro Khanykin's work as a lawyer or his specific legal background. He has not established any companies in his name, nor does he possess a lawyer's certificate. His public and community activities are also not highlighted in public sources.

In 2016, he obtained a Master's degree in Law from the Institute of Business Education in the Legal Regulation of the Economy program. In the same year, he began searching for employment in the civil service. He applied for a competition to the State Treasury Service for the position of Chief Specialist in the Audit Department but changed his mind and did not appear for testing.

During the same time, Khanykin attempted to become a specialist in the Internal Audit Department of the State Property Fund. However, he was unsuccessful, scoring very low on the testing process. In 2022, Khanykin entered postgraduate studies at the National Pedagogical Drahomanov University.

Yuriy Obodzinsky – Adviser on Legal Affairs

Yuriy Obodzinsky is a colleague of Olena Duma in the trade union movement. He founded the Federation of Trade Unions of Ukraine "Trade Union Offensive", while Duma served as the Deputy Chairman of this organisation. At public events, Olena Duma also presented herself as a founder of this organisation.

In 2018, Yuriy Obodzinsky, as the Head of the Federation of Trade Unions "Trade Union Offensive", signed a memorandum of cooperation with the Valentyn Nalyvaychenko Movement "Spravedlyvist" ("Justice". – Mind). Olena Duma was the coordinator of this political force, although she did not disclose this information in her official biography.

Obodzinsky seemingly has ambitions for working in the civil service. In 2021, he aimed to become the Deputy Head of the State Service for Quality Education for Digital Development, Digital Transformation, and Digitalisation. However, he did not succeed in the competition for the position.

Sergiy Bomchak – Adviser on Legal Affairs

There is very little information available about this adviser in open sources. Bomchak's biography has many gaps, making it difficult to determine his activities during significant periods of his life. Bomchak has profiles on Facebook and VKontakte (a russian social network), but he does not publish news or updates on them.

It's known that Bomchak graduated from Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. In 2006, he was a member of the All-Ukrainian Party of Labour. During the same year, he ran for the Verkhovna Rada (Ukrainian parliament) elections, indicating in his application that he was temporarily unemployed. He was not elected to the parliament.

From 2010 to 2015, he was a deputy of the Kyiv Oblast Council. In 2015, he worked as an adviser to Volodymyr Omelian, the Deputy Minister of Infrastructure. After two months, he became the head of the state enterprise Administration of River Ports and held this position until 2018. In 2019, he became the Head of the Dredging Fleet branch of the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority (USPA). However, there has been no news about his activities in this role since 2020. Thus, his activities over the last three years are unknown.

Mind's conclusion. An adviser can be useful if he or she is at least in some respects much more competent than the head of a state body. However, in terms of competence and professional experience, none of Olena Duma's advisers had ever dealt with issues related to criminal proceedings, asset tracing and management, or international cooperation in these areas.