Just before the New Year the honest Swiss citizens noted some abnormality: something grandiose, not just a villa, is being constructed in the resort town of Villar sur Ollon. Three storeys over the mountain slope and more six storeys in the rock made the newspaper “Tribune de Geneve” be amazed: the host and his guests will be able to have a Jacuzzi, sauna or Turkish bath, to have a swim with underwater speakers, and to have a good time in the cinema or on the indoor tennis court. Only initial cost of the site was estimated by the newspaper to be 58 million Swiss francs.
The prestige high-land ski resort place is not used commonly for such a luxury, even considering the fact that different millionaires have been seen in Alps villages. When it was found out that the complex is being built for Russians, then the rumour had it that the villa named Constantine must belong to Vladimir Putin himself.
Having studied the situation, we realized that the Swiss people would never be able to understand Russia as it has the wrong ideas about possibilities by our citizens and about the proportion of our wealth. Even Putin’s yacht must be more luxurious than that small, in Russian scale, house. And that villa has relation only to the relatives of the former deputy of the legislative Assembly of Kaluga region, Dmitry Rybak.
We managed to ring up to his spouse, Alla Rybak. According to her, she had had a very unpleasant conversation with Tribune de Geneve and 24’Heures and she was indignant. She was upset that the newspaper had interpreted everything in bad: the price and Putin’s name mentioned… First reaction of her husband was the wish to contact President’s press office.
Dmitry Rybak’s wife said that the mentioned by Swiss journalists amount of cost was overstated more than 5 times as much. She also noted they have nothing to conceal as all the income was declared officially and no questions arose about it.
We wanted to have comment by Dmitry Rybak and left our contact details with the wife, but Mr Rybak did not contact us back.
Dmitry Rybak was the deputy of the Legislative Assembly at Kaluga region from 1996-2000. Till August 2006 he headed agricultural OAO Ugra situated in the region and engaged, in particular, in breeding of the pigs of the large white colored strain. According to the report for the year of 2006, the average number of pigs stock at the enterprise was 623 plus 649 heads of cattle.
In July 2006, the municipal inspector of the agricultural lands of Dzerzhinsky district at Kaluga region, the head of the District Agricultural Committee, Ivan Parshikov, said in his interview to the local newspaper Novoe Vremya (fittingly, New Times) that Ugra possesses 10,072 hectares of plowed field plus 8,000 hectares are the private property of Mr Dmitry Rybak. The inspector expressed his anxiety that much of the land was put out of the agricultural turnover.
Previously, Dmitry Rybak ran a Moscow company Sovinkom that let on lease its own immovable property. He also headed the representative office of the Swiss firm Excel Voyages S.A. in Russia. According to the Swiss register of the enterprises, this travel agency was based in Villar sur Ollon, i.e. exactly in the place where the Constantine villa is being constructed. The former’s deputy’s son, Constantine Rybak, was manager with sole power to sign in that travel agency. We failed to find out if the villa is named after him and if this is the hotel project of the family.
“We have a long lasting tradition of making comfortable our own homes first. Small families have always liked to construct huge mansions. It’s only now that the taxes got to be calculated” reasons Yuri Skuratov, former Prosecutor General. “On the other hand, the international practice has proved that investment of money in real estate is the most reliable way. Real estate, as well as land, is always going up. Finally, such an investment is the simplest way. One may earn well in the stock market but one may also lose everything. And many our citizens, who made fortunes this or that way, do not have good qualifications for that. Plus a delicate question of where the money originated from…”
Russians always build on the large scale. Of course, seeing the scale, the Swiss start to think about our first persons. But that’s not true. “We are the greatest!” laughs the former Prosecutor General.
According to the Swiss laws, a foreigner can buy land for construction if he or she can prove there is necessity in a plot and if this person has resided in the country no less than 5 years. Probable are also complex procedures of registration with the use of juridical persons.
Just to compare, the three-level Swiss house of the famous German Formula 1 racer Michael Schumacher, whose fortune is estimated to be $750,000,000, cost him about 33 million of Swiss francs.
Reference by Novaya Gazeta
Dmitry Rybal also used to be the chair of board at Kaluzhsky Land Shareholder Bank. His wife Alla and his son Constantine were also members of the board. Sovinkom, Ugra and Excel Voyages (Russian and Swiss companies) possessed 51% of the bank’s stock. In 2004 the bank came to other owners.
Not only Excel Voyages from Villar sur Ollon, but also Swiss Helvex Oil S.A. (it is liquidated now) were co-founders of Sovinkom firm. When it was working, Helvex founded jointly with Nizhegorodnefteorgsintez the Helvex Oil Company that has branches in Kaluga and Dzerjinsk possessing a number of petrol stations.
Sovinkom, Excel Voyages and Ugra were also co-founders of the Sovinkom Bank. The enterprises from aviation industry, oil and gas extracting firms, petroleum products manufacturers and sellers and also agricultural companies were among the bank’s customers. The state office of Main Department of Moscow Monuments Protection (later it became to be named Cultural Heritage Committee, or Moskomnasledie) was another co-founder of the bank being embodied by Vladimir Sokolovsky (former chief of the Department and former chair of the Committee) and Vladimir Bakalyarov (former chief of the monumental art department). At the time being the bank belongs to other proprietors, its main shareholder is designing and industrial giant Obyedinenie Ingeokom.
In 2001 the Moscow branch of Excel Voyages was given the building #8 on the Prospekt Mira Boulevard and acted as the customer of the project.
