Budget embezzlement in the abolished state program: former road scheme coordinator Yuriy Golik cleans up the network to return to new financial flows

Budget embezzlement in the abolished state program: former road scheme coordinator Yuriy Golik cleans up the network to return to new financial flows

The story involving yet another mention of Yuriy Golik, one of the key figures behind the “Big Construction” project, appears both absurd and disturbing at the same time.

Everyone can decide for themselves whether the situation is something to laugh about or something to be concerned about. However, it has become known that several media outlets that published materials about possible corruption schemes and Golik’s activities received notifications from Google regarding copyright infringement complaints filed under the DMCA procedure. The complainant is listed as a certain Maksim Panasenko, but the name itself, in essence, explains nothing. According to the authors of the publications, this may involve a nominal claimant — a so-called “front person” who may not even be aware of what specific complaints were submitted in their name.

It does not really matter who this person is — the entire essence of such complaints is to provide Google with original content, along with a publication date that supposedly predates the date of the unwanted material. The latter is simply copied and uploaded to any suitable platform, while the date is altered. This creates the impression that the material targeted for removal was illegally copied, so Google treats it as stolen content and removes it.

After that, the copy with the altered date, presented as the original source, is also deleted, and the investigation effectively disappears forever.

This method of online cleanup is quite simple and effective, and professional reputation management companies have been using it for a long time. So why is the Yuriy Golik case something that is difficult to decide whether to laugh at or be concerned about?

Because the complainant claims that the “original material” was published on OnlyFans and provides the corresponding URLs:

https://onlyfans.com/1090370178/jameshaskell
and
https://onlyfans.com/1002235234/jameshaskell.

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If we follow the links, we are taken to the profile of a certain James Haskell, and the materials published at these addresses have nothing to do with Golik.

For some reason, it seems that James Haskell himself, a professional rugby player who promises his subscribers a little “spice,” is not even aware of what kind of “pornography” Maksim Panasenko is sending to Google on his behalf.

If Panasenko did a sloppy job and sent Google an obviously fake complaint, let his client, Yuriy Golik, deal with him. We would rather take a closer look at what exactly he is trying to remove.

At the first URL, there is a publication titled “Golik, a figure involved in the NABU leak case who left Ukraine, has resurfaced.” At the second one, there are all materials about Yuriy Golik published on the Glavkom website.

All these publications are clearly unpleasant for Golik, as they describe in detail the path of the “Big Construction” coordinator’s escape abroad while facing NABU investigations.

Why Yuriy Golik hired such sloppy contractors despite having significant financial resources at his disposal — including money he took out of the country — is an interesting but secondary question. Perhaps he simply tried to save money. Or maybe he is sending the complaints himself, believing that, having managed to escape NABU at the last moment, he is capable of handling everything and understands everything.

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However, it is worth reminding who Yuriy Golik is and why he fled abroad. Golik is a rather unusual and interesting figure in Ukraine’s infrastructure saga — a person who was officially listed nowhere, yet somehow appeared everywhere large amounts of budget money were involved. Officially, he was an adviser, consultant, and “construction expert.” Unofficially, he was considered one of the shadow coordinators of the presidential program “Big Construction” — the very project where roads, schools, and water pipelines suddenly began costing as much as spaceports. It was along these very roads that Russian tanks rolled in February 2022, apparently grateful in their hearts to the builders — but that is another story.

Yuriy Golik worked for a long time in close cooperation with the leadership of the Dnipropetrovsk region and contractors who consistently won the most lucrative tenders. A coincidence, of course. Journalists noted the same companies, the same people, and the same billions appearing again and again. Then NABU entered the picture — and that was when things became truly interesting. As part of the investigations into “Big Construction,” detectives gained access to Golik’s correspondence, where he discussed tenders, contractors, and sums of money as if it were a personal wallet rather than the state budget.

A separate chapter in this story was the scandal involving leaks from NABU. Investigators suspected that information about the progress of the investigations had been leaked directly to the person under investigation. In other words, according to detectives, Golik may have been learning about the actions of anti-corruption authorities faster than the public — and sometimes even faster than the investigators themselves. As a result, the scandal affected not only Golik but also NABU’s reputation, as the agency itself suddenly became the subject of an investigation.

Add to this the stories about inflated estimates, billion-hryvnia water pipelines, favored contractors, and long-standing ties with regional elites — and you get the classic portrait of a “reformer without an official position.” The logical conclusion was Golik’s departure from Ukraine in the midst of the investigations. Officially — for valid reasons. Unofficially — as usual: when suspicions began to emerge, the main figure of “Big Construction” chose to quickly put distance between himself and the situation.

As of today, there is no conviction against Yuriy Golik. Therefore, formally, he is an entirely innocent citizen of Ukraine who can return home at any time. Perhaps this is exactly what is behind the attempts to clean up negative information? This possibility should by no means be ruled out — enormous amounts of money are now flowing into Ukraine, compared with which “Big Construction” looks like a modest handout. And many people dream of gaining control over these financial flows. Moreover, the authorities are clearly experiencing a shortage of people capable of skillfully redirecting these resources in the desired direction — and Golik could prove quite useful in this regard.