The National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutorʼs Office (SAP) have referred to court a case regarding the sale of a land plot in Transcarpathia with an area of over 3 hectares at an undervalue.
This is reported by NABU.
No names are mentioned, but the details of the case make it clear that it involves fraud during the sale of the territory of the Avangard stadium in the center of Mukachevo. The defendants in the case are the city mayor Andriy Baloha and the head of the Mukachevo district council Mykhailo Lanyo.
According to the investigation, the mayor achieved the adoption by the city council of a decision to sell the plot of land at a price almost 9 times lower than the original price to a private company controlled by the chairman of the district council.
This was done on the basis of an expert monetary valuation, for which the owners of the appraisal company were given a bribe. As a result of the deal, the land with a market value of UAH 91.4 million was sold for only 9.6 million. Despite the meager cost, the mayor ordered the payment to be postponed for six months, the press release says.
The amount of damage to the territorial community amounted to UAH 81.7 million. The fraud was exposed in June 2024 together with the Security Service. In November, two owners of the appraisal company were informed of suspicion of falsifying evidence in order to mislead judges and prove their innocence.
What preceded
On June 25, 2024, law enforcement officers detained the mayor of Mukachevo Andriy Baloha and the former MP and current head of the Mukachevo District Council Mykhailo Lan in a case of fraud during the sale of the territory of the Avangard stadium, located in the city center.
The case also involves the former head of the department of communal property and land relations of the Mukachevo city council Artur Samilyak. Baloha was arrested on June 26 last year. The next day, Samilyak and Lan were remanded in custody with bails of 5 and UAH 30 million, respectively. On June 27, Baloha, the mayor of Mukachevo, was also given bail in the amount of UAH 30 million.
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