Ukrainian politician and businessman Yevgeny Chervonenko: biography, family, career

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:55

Chervonenko Evgeny Alfredovich belongs to the type of people who are used to achieving success in various fields. He reached heights as a businessman, racing driver, politician. Of course, it was very difficult for Yevgeny Chervonenko to reach his goal. The biography and personal life of this person will be the subject of our study.

Childhood

Yevgeny Chervonenko was born in December 1959 in the city of Dnepropetrovsk, in a Jewish family of Alfred Chervonenko, a professor at the Dnepropetrovsk Mining Institute. Evgeny Alfredovich's mother was the daughter of Israel Solomonovich Marshak, who worked as a vice-rector at the same institute as her husband, who, in turn, was a cousin of the famous children's writer Samuil Yakovlevich Marshak. The family also had a younger son, Igor, about whom E. A. Chervonenko always spoke very warmly.

Chervonenko Evgeny Alfredovich in 1977 graduated from school number 23, at that time the most prestigious in Dnepropetrovsk. His classmate was the future famous businessman Eduard Shifrin. A year later, the future billionaire and son-in-law of Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma Viktor Pinchuk graduated from the same school.

DuringEvgeniy Chervonenko was notable for his particularly good knowledge of mathematics, as evidenced by regular victories in mathematical Olympiads. While studying in Dnepropetrovsk, he also simultaneously graduated from the Physics and Mathematics School in Moscow, which is subordinate to the Institute of Physics and Technology.

Youth

After graduating from school, Evgeny Chervonenko enters the DGI Institute, located in his hometown, and studies engineering. Initially, he tried to enter the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, which oversaw the school that Chervonenko graduated from in absentia, but did not pass the competition. According to Evgeny Alfredovich himself, this was due to his nationality. At that time, there was an unspoken order in the USSR on the admission of a limited number of Jewish students to universities.

Despite the fact that, thanks to excellent academic performance, Evgeny received a high Lenin scholarship for those times, he also worked as a driver in the Avtotrans organization, as a mechanic, and worked as a laboratory assistant. Evgeny Alfredovich successfully graduated from the university in 1982.

After graduating from the institute, he worked as an engineer in the design department of the Dnepromashobogashchenie enterprise in Dnepropetrovsk. There he proved himself to be a true professional, and even wrote a dissertation.

Car driver career

Over time, Yevgeny Chervonenko realized that after all, engineering activity is not his field. From early childhood, he was kind to cars and dreamed of becoming a race car driver. At the amateur level (and there simply could not be another in the USSR at that time), Evgeny Chervonenko was still at the timestudying at the university began to engage in motorsport. In 1980, he enrolled in the section of this sports discipline. Already in 1981 he was included in the national team of the Ukrainian SSR.

In 1983, Chervonenko won the titles of the winner of the Spartakiad and the championship of the Ukrainian SSR. In 1985, he became a member of the USSR national team and received the title of master of sports. He participated in the championships of the USSR and Europe, where he won prizes and became the winner. In 1988, Evgeny Alfredovich became the champion of the USSR Spartakiad, and a year later he received the title of master of sports of international class.

Meanwhile, the country was going through a time of significant changes in leadership policy and public life. No wonder this period acquired the name "Perestroika". In those years, there were significant indulgences in the field of human rights and freedoms, it was allowed to engage in small business and professional sports. Until then, all Soviet athletes were considered amateurs.

At the end of 1986, Evgeny Chervonenko became one of the first professional racing drivers in the USSR. Already at the turn of 1987 and 1988, he became one of the organizers of the first Soviet professional racing team, which had the iconic name Perestroika. Assistance in the formation of the team Evgeny Alfredovich was provided by his partner Alexander Salyuk. Rumor has it that the organization of a professional team, whose activities were based on self-financing, became real thanks to a personal meeting between Yevgeny Chervonenko and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, organized byhigh-ranking friends of the racing driver.

First steps in business

Having organized a professional team, Evgeny Alfredovich realized that entrepreneurship in the new economic conditions is a very promising area for activity. In parallel with the racing team, he created a company for the provision of transportation services called Transrally. In fact, both organizations were part of the same structure. Income from competitions in which the racing team took part went to the development of a trucking company.

Thus, Evgeny Chervonenko became one of the first people in the USSR who successfully started doing business. According to Yevgeny Alfredovich himself, he became a millionaire back in Soviet times.

Further business success

Over time, Chervonenko realized the need to expand the scope of activities. In 1992, after the adoption of the Declaration of Independence by Ukraine, Yevgeny Alfredovich co-founded the Lvov Van Pur enterprise, which was the first in the territory of the former USSR to start producing canned beer. In 1994, he became the chairman of the board of the Rogan Van Pur company, and a year later, the chairman of the Ukraine Van Pur group of companies.

Yevgeny Chervonenko was not going to stop there. Ukraine Van Pur gained more and more confident positions in the domestic beer market.

In 1995, Yevgeny Chervonenko reached a new height by becoming a member of the Ukrainian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs. After heis a member of the board of this respected organization, and also becomes the chairman of one of the commissions.

In 1997, Evgeny Alfredovich is a member of the Council of Entrepreneurs, which operates under the government of Ukraine, becomes a member of the Federation of Employers, and the following year - an adviser to the President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma.

In 1997, the Orlan concern appeared. In it, until 2000 inclusive, he holds the position of president and is its actual owner. After 2000, in connection with his departure to the civil service, Evgeny Alfredovich became the honorary president of Orlan, and his second wife Margarita Chervonenko and brother Igor received the actual management of the company. This state of affairs continued until 2007. Chervonenko's wife served as the president of the concern, but then the couple divorced, which led to the loss of her status in the company.

Public service

In 2000, Evgeny Alfredovich received the post of chairman of the State Agency for Material Reserve Management. It was a time of new opportunities for Yevgeny Chervonenko. Goskomrezerv became another significant milestone in his biography. This was the first position in the civil service, which he held until 2001.

During this period, the State Committee for Reserves contributed in every possible way to the development of Igor Chervonenko's company, but there were no accusations of corruption brought by official bodies against Evgeny Alfredovich.

In 2001, Evgeny Chervonenko was fired. This decision was motivated by the need to reorganizeState Committee for Reserves, but everyone understood that in fact this was due to the resignation of the Cabinet of Ministers of Viktor Yushchenko.

The beginning of a political career

After leaving the civil service, Yevgeny Chervonenko plunged into political activity. Being a non-partisan, in 2002 he took part in the elections to the Verkhovna Rada on the lists of the Our Ukraine bloc. The party took first place in the elections, and Yevhen Alfredovich, who was thirtieth on the list, became a member of the Ukrainian parliament.

During his stay in the Verkhovna Rada, he served as Secretary of the Committee on Construction and Transport, and also joined several groups for inter-parliamentary relations.

At the same time, a major scandal erupted. Authorities accused Chervonenko of having Israeli citizenship, in connection with which they demanded that Yevgeny Alfredovich be deprived of his deputy and citizenship of Ukraine, since dual citizenship is prohibited in Ukrainian law.

Presidential elections and the Orange Revolution

In the 2004 presidential elections, as expected, Chervonenko supported Viktor Yushchenko, during whose premiership he managed the State Committee for Reserves, and now he was a member of the parliamentary faction headed by him. Moreover, he largely financed the election campaign and was its treasurer.

After the incumbent Prime Minister of Ukraine Viktor Yanukovych won the presidential election, according to the initial results of voting, Yevgeny Chervonenko took an active part in a large-scaleprotest movement that challenged the validity of the vote count, dubbed the Orange Revolution. In particular, he led the security of V. Yushchenko.

The opposition managed to hold an additional round of elections, during which Viktor Yushchenko won.

Government activities

After the so-called "orange coalition" came to power, Yevgeny Chervonenko could reasonably count on a ministerial portfolio or other high position, since he himself made a lot of effort and money to win Viktor Yushchenko in the elections.

At first, Yevgeny Alfredovich was offered to take the post of Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but he refused this post. However, after some time he said that he regrets this decision. Since February 2005, he has headed the Ministry of Transport and Communications.

One of the first steps in the new post of Yevgeny Chervonenko was the decision to terminate all contracts with contractors signed by his predecessors. According to him, after the signing of new, really profitable contracts, revenues to the budget will increase significantly. He also conducted a series of anti-corruption checks in the ministry, which revealed a whole bunch of abuses. In turn, accusations of corruption of Yevgeny Alfredovich himself were heard in the press, but no actual evidence of a single fact was provided.

In December 2005, Yulia Tymoshenko's cabinet resigned, thus, Yevgeny Chervonenko lost his chair, and the Ministry of Transport - the head. Then he ledAutomobile Federation of Ukraine.

Governor

Nevertheless, Chervonenko did not remain without work in the civil service. He received the post of head of the Zaporozhye regional administration, or, as they say, the governor. It is quite possible that Viktor Yushchenko's decision on this appointment was influenced by Chervonenko's close acquaintance with the owners of Zaporizhstal - Alex Schneider and Eduard Shifrin. With the latter, as mentioned above, Evgeny Alfredovich even studied in the same class.

Despite fears that the appointment of one of the leaders of the Orange Revolution as the head of the generally supportive of Yanukovych region, one of the leaders of the Orange Revolution may cause discontent among the population, the governorship of Yevgeny Chervonenko passed quite calmly. On his part, too, there was no provocation of the local elite. The only nuance that could give rise to a conflict was the installation in Zaporozhye, under the direct patronage of E. A. Chervonenko, of a monument to the victims of the Holodomor. But the conflict never broke out.

The chair of the head of the regional administration was held by the former Minister of Transport until December 2007.

Further career

Leaving the post of governor of the Zaporozhye region, most likely, was associated with the return of Yulia Tymoshenko to the premiership.

Since December 2007, Chervonenko was entrusted with an important mission - to be the head of the National Agency for organizing the European Football Championship, which was to be held in Ukraine in 2012. However, the agency was liquidated at the end of 2008.

After that EugeneAlfredovich, at the suggestion of the Kyiv head Leonid Chernovitsky, became his deputy. At the same time, in 2008, he was re-elected head of the Automobile Federation of Ukraine and held this position until 2011 inclusive.

In 2010, he went on parental leave, refusing to remain an adviser to the Kyiv mayor.

In the first round of the presidential elections in 2010, he supported V. Yushchenko, but after he did not pass to the second round, he openly declared his support for Viktor Yanukovych. This was the first step towards rapprochement with his former political opponents, who by that time had come to power.

In 2011, Chervonenko returned to public service. He began to work in senior positions in the Ministry of Emergency Situations - first as the head of the department, and then as deputy minister.

Modern stage

What is Evgeny Alfredovich Chervonenko doing now? Today, after the change of power that took place in early 2014, this politician is not in public service. During this period, he also did not run for any elective office. Nevertheless, he continues to take part in the public discussion of political events.

For example, at the very beginning of the conflict in Donbass, Yevgeny Chervonenko accused the current Ukrainian government of “corrosion of morality”, indecision and inability to make responsible decisions.

In the same 2014, live on the TSN news program of the 1 + 1 channel, a major scandal arose between Evgeny Chervonenko andjournalist Tatyana Chernovol, whom he accused of illegal actions to seize private property.

Already in 2016, Yevgeny Chervonenko made a public statement throughout Ukraine about lawlessness of the police. This statement was provoked by an unprecedented pursuit that the police staged in a crowded Kyiv behind a single car with the use of firearms. Chervonenko sharply criticized the professional training of law enforcement officers.

Another scandal occurred between E. Chervonenko and the governor of the Odessa region Mikhail Saakashvili on the air of Savik Shuster's program. During the skirmish, Saakashvili accused the former transport minister of using corruption schemes.

Nevertheless, despite his public appearances, Yevgeny Chervonenko currently remains out of big politics.

Activities in Jewish organizations

Among other things, Yevgeny Chervonenko is known as a major functionary of various Jewish organizations. He never hid his national identity and was proud of it. This trait of his was clearly manifested even in Soviet times, when Jews were limited in their right to education and denied access to high positions.

While still in high school, Evgeny Chervonenko seriously injured one person because of offensive comments about the Jewish people. This decisive act cost him the gold medal.

According to Chervonenko, it was his nationality that served as an obstacle to entering a prestigious Moscow university.

After the fall of the communist regime,Yevgeny Chervonenko got the opportunity to take part in the activities of the Jewish community as much as possible. There is even a version that he was able to open his first large company, Lvov Van Pur, thanks to the capital of the Irish community of Jews.

In 1999, E. Chervonenko with a group of people, which included such well-known figures as Y. Zvyagilsky and S. Maksimov, co-founded the Jewish Confederation of Ukraine (JCU). This organization was supposed to be a worthy alternative to the All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress of Vadim Rabinovich. This fact caused a rather tough confrontation between Chervonenko and Rabinovich, which lasted about two years.

In 2001, Yevgeny Alfredovich became a member of the Council of National Minorities (withdrew from it in 2003), naturally, being a representative of the Jewish nation. At the same time, he left the JCU and established friendly relations with V. Rabinovich, in whose organization he received the position of head of the board of trustees.

In 2002, Evgeny Alfredovich took a high post in another large Jewish organization. He was entrusted with the position of vice-president of the Eurasian Jewish Congress. This organization was an association of a number of Jewish societies in Kazakhstan, Russia and Ukraine. In 2005 EJC became a member of the World Jewish Congress.

As a parliamentarian, Yevgeny Alfredovich was a member of one of the deputy groups that supported relations with Israel. At the same time, Chervonenko was accused of having Israeli citizenship (althoughunsubstantiated), which almost cost him his deputy and even citizenship of Ukraine.

In 2007, E. Chervonenko was appointed by the European Jewish Congress as a delegate for the nuances of interaction with the countries of Eastern and Central Europe. Then he was elected vice-president of the United Jewish Community of Ukraine, headed by Rabinovich. But, after billionaire Igor Kolomoisky became the leader of the organization, Yevgeny Alfredovich also left leadership roles in this structure.

Currently, when Chervonenko is not an employee of state structures or a deputy, he is most often presented in the press as vice-president of the European Jewish Congress.

Family

Yevgeny Chervonenko's family life was rather difficult.

In his first marriage, his wife was the daughter of a high-ranking party official. In this union, in 1987, the daughter of Alexander was born. But the marriage soon fell apart.

Yevgeny Chervonenko got married for the second time. His chosen one was the beautiful Margarita. They had a daughter - Victoria Chervonenko. At first, their family life was going pretty well. After leaving for the civil service, E. Chervonenko even handed over the management of the company to his wife. But in 2006, they began to notice him surrounded by another woman, whose name was Nina. In 2007, the divorce of Yevgeny Alfredovich and Margarita followed, which was accompanied by a major scandal over the division of property and other issues.

Soon, Evgeny Alfredovich married for the third time - the girl whocaused the breakup of a previous marriage. Nina Chervonenko is 13 years younger than her husband. She has a son from her first marriage - Cyril. In addition, she gave Yevgeny Alfredovich a male heir, since they had a son, Alfred Chervonenko, named after his grandfather.

General characteristics

One of the most famous political figures in Ukraine is Yevhen Chervonenko. His biography is full of interesting facts and unexpected twists. He knew in his life both ups and downs.

Being a multifaceted person. Evgeny Alfredovich tried to prove himself in various fields: in science, sports, business, politics, social activities. And everywhere he managed to achieve certain heights.

Yevgeny Chervonenko is characterized as a purposeful, firm, but impulsive person. He is not afraid to speak the truth, while not shying away from rather harsh expressions.