On the verge of ruin

Dozens of small and medium-sized construction companies and carriers that were subcontractors in the construction of the Zenit Arena stadium, the western high-speed diameter and the M-11 Moscow-Petersburg highway were bankrupt or on the verge of bankruptcy . This situation immediately caused social tension in St. Petersburg and the paralysis of the local construction market. In addition, the victims of non -payment even threaten to block the federal highway.

On the western high-speed diameter and M-11 Moscow-Petersburg, ICA, a joint venture of the Turkish company IC ICTAS and the Italian Astaldi, led. ICA, having concluded contracts with subcontractors, dozens of small and medium -sized firms, refused to pay for the work done, thereby putting them on the brink of bankruptcy. Now more than twenty companies-for the rental of special equipment, the production of concrete and construction-filed lawsuits in the Arbitration Court of St. Petersburg. For companies such as Leader-Prom, Barkada, Rental Unit and others, ICA owed 10-15 million rubles each, it should more than one hundred million rubles.

Most of all of non-payment were affected by carriers-carriers that worked as subcontractors on the M-11 Moscow-Petersburg highway

The reasons for non -payment are unclear: ICA phones are not responding, company representatives avoid communicating with journalists. The carrier companies that worked as subcontractors on the M-11 Moscow-Petersburg highway suffered most of all non-payment. On Monday, they tried to hold a protest on this highway, but did not overlap it at the request of the traffic police. As a result, they demanded repayment of debt from the ICA passing working headquarters.

Vladimir Matyan , President of the Khozavtotrans Association, uniting carrier-carriers, so outlined the current situation:

-A very difficult situation has developed for all contractors, not only in the western speed diameter, where they have not been paid since July-August of the month. But now the situation of the M-11 route is more aggravated to all subcontractors, carriers and builders should already have about four billion rubles. The construction market has stood up today. These four billion put the entire construction sector on the brink of ruin.

We will block the entrances and block the work of the Turkish company until a serious conversation begins and pay for all financial obligations

We negotiated in December. A number of meetings were with subcontractors and carriers, we also met with the Turkish company and said: "You promised us something, and all our promises ignored." Closing their current holes, ignored the fact that carriers, builders now cannot fulfill obligations on leasing, salaries and the like. Literally this week on Friday, we had a meeting with the leadership of the Turkish company. And they guaranteed this week to start closing, but again ignored. Judging by this situation, this is done intentionally, for bankruptcy.

Next week there will be a large -scale action, because carriers say that they do not intend to wait anymore. "We will block the entrances and block the work of the Turkish company until a serious conversation and payment of all financial obligations begin," they tell me.

The Turkish company behaved completely abnormally and must fall under serious sanctions

We believe that the Turkish company behaved completely abnormally and must fall under serious sanctions to compensate the carriers with their losses, ”Vladimir Matyan believes.

The customer of the construction of the central section of the Western high-speed diameter-the Consortium "General of the Northern Capital" officially relieved responsibility for the activities of the Italo-Turkish company ICA, which he attracted as a contractor for the construction of this highway. The official position of the consortium was voiced by the head of its public relations department Andrei Tsapu :

The customer has no access to the commercial conditions that the contractor sets for subcontracting organizations and suppliers

- in accordance with the contract for the construction of sections of the western high -speed diameter, concluded between the "Railway of the Northern Capital" and the ICA company, commercial issues of procurement of materials and services of subcontracting organizations are in the competence of ICA. The "Highway of the Northern Capital" does not have access to commercial conditions that the contractor sets for subcontracting organizations and suppliers. Payment from the "Highway of the Northern Capital" to ICA is carried out on the basis of certificates verified by an independent engineer, and the entire certified volume of work is paid in a timely manner.

In the same spirit and the official statement of the customer of the construction of the section of the M-11 highway, the Consortium "General of the two capitals", which attracted the same Italo-Turkish ICA for the construction of the route.

-acceptance and payment of work performed is carried out according to large elements of the facility, which is a fairly voluminous completed complex of construction and installation works. In this regard, there is a gap between the partial performance of work according to these elements and the emergence of the right of the general contractor to hand over and receive payment for them - this is how the Magistral of the two capitals explained the possible reason for the failure.

But there is also the third large construction project in St. Petersburg, at which dozens of subcontractors who had completed their work also turned out to be either bankrupt or on the verge of bankruptcy. This is the Zenit Arena stadium. Says the Vice President of the St. Petersburg Union of Construction Organizations Lev Kaplan :

At first they say: you do it, without a contract, without everything, and then they say that you did bad

-At the Zenit-Arena, the situation is even worse. There, subcontractors were attracted when, in fact, there was no additional funding to quickly make objects, as the vice-governor of St. Petersburg Igor Albin demanded. These are companies of electricians, plumbers, a Finnish company that makes video surveillance, and others. A number of companies that carry out work, and they do not pay for two or three months or, ultimately, do not pay at all, until, they say, there will not be common money. And when they appear, no one knows. In the civilized world, they concluded a contract, accepted the work, paid. And we have the opposite. At first they say: you do, without a contract, without everything, and then they say that you did badly. Here is mold. And the mold at the stadium due to the fact that the piles were not scored deep enough, and there the water enters. This is a general practice, which, unfortunately, was directly rooted among our developers.

Turkish companies believe that the Russian arbitration court is not a law for them. And there is nothing to say with the stadium, there are criminal cases (Marat Oganesyan, the ex-Vice-Governor of St. Petersburg, is accused of embezzlement of more than 50 million rubles.-RS) . For contractors, hundreds of millions of rubles were not paid.

In total, according to Kaplan, due to massive non-payments over the past two years in St. Petersburg, the number of bankruptcies of small construction firms has increased five times.