The prosecutor's office looked into the circumstances of the sale of the Pskov energy company

The Prosecutor's Office of the Pskov Region opened a criminal case regarding the sale of the property complex of the municipal private state unitary enterprise "Pskovoblenergo" to the company "Pskovenergoinvest". Among the defendants in the case is the regional governor, Evgeny Mikhailov, who authorized the transaction, as a result of which the regional property was sold at a third lower than the book value.
Created in 1997 by order of Governor Mikhailov, PEGUP Pskovoblenergo controlled approximately half of the region’s energy system. The company purchased electricity from the second operator, Pskovenergo OJSC, which is part of the RAO UES system, reselling it to large enterprises and municipal administrations.

The reason for the investigation, which is being conducted under Article 160, Part 2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (misappropriation or embezzlement of property), was an inspection carried out by the KRU of the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation. The official results of the audit have not yet been made public, but, according to Kommersant's information, the auditors were interested in the details of the sale of Pskovoblenergo's electrical networks to a certain Pskovenergoinvest LLC. The deal, concluded shortly before the gubernatorial elections last August, was widely covered in the pro-government press as an example of “attracting a third-party investor capable of solving the problems of the energy industry.” But, as it turned out during the audit, the property had a book value of more than 95 million rubles. was sold for 66.5 million rubles. At the same time, the buyer paid for the energy system not in cash, but with bills accepted at par. According to the KRU auditors, the transaction, which was personally agreed to by Governor Mikhailov, was carried out in violation of both local and federal legislation. Thus, contrary to the requirements of the Charter of the Pskov Region, the sale of PEGUP property was not agreed upon with the local Duma. According to the KRU, the administration “assessed the market value of the property at the residual value,” which is why the transaction amount was greatly underestimated. Finally, the buyer of the property himself raised doubts among the inspectors: Pskovenergoinvest LLC was registered only two weeks before the transaction by several individuals and “was not located at the legal address specified in the purchase and sale agreement.”
Representatives of the regional prosecutor's office refrain from commenting, stating that the case was initiated "based on the results of an investigation by the KRU and does not yet have specific defendants." However, some assumptions can be made about the reasons for the sale. According to unofficial information, the real owner of the networks was not the nominal buyer Pskovenergoinvest, but the second energy operator in the region, Pskovenergo. Previously, the company owned by RAO UES had repeatedly expressed dissatisfaction with the presence of a reseller, but it was not possible to come to an agreement with the administration of Mr. Mikhailov, and before the gubernatorial elections, Pskovenergo came up with a spectacular scheme that made it possible to achieve control over the competitor.
Since the beginning of the summer of 2000, Pskovenergo has demanded that Pskovoblenergo pay for electricity not through bill of exchange schemes, but in cash. The latter was unable to fulfill the requirement, and its financial situation began to deteriorate - by August, PEGUP’s debt to RAO exceeded 140 million rubles. Then the governor was asked to sell the company’s property to a “third-party investor,” otherwise large-scale rolling blackouts would begin right before the elections in Pskov. And before the eyes of Mr. Mikhailov there was a sad example - in January-February 2000, the then mayor of Pskov, Alexander Prokofiev, lost the elections after a series of power outages in the city. Finding himself in a similar situation, the governor could agree to any conditions of Pskovenergo.
NATALIA DENISOVA, Pskov

Newspaper "Kommersant St. Petersburg" No. 67/P dated April 16, 2001, p. 2

Energy crisis of Governor Mikhailov